LAHORE: The PTI-led Punjab government is all set to get the new Local Government Bill 2019 passed from the provincial assembly on Tuesday (today) as it has asked all its lawmakers to ensure their presence in the house for the purpose.

On the other hand the opposition PML-N has announced resisting any such move of the government.

The Chief Minister’s Secretariat was approaching all treasury benches legislators on Monday to direct them attend the all-important Punjab Assembly session on Tuesday. It has also arranged a breakfast meeting for the MPAs followed by a joint parliamentary party meeting of the PTI and PML-Q to frame a strategy for maintaining quorum during the session.

Apparently for those who wake up late in the morning, proceedings of the session have been rescheduled for 2pm against the tradition of holding the sitting in the morning (at 10 or 11am).

Opposition vows to resist ‘haste’

Interestingly, Tuesday is private members day as per parliamentary calendar but the government has got the day changed to introduce the bill showing the urgency the rulers are attaching to the new law.

Opposition leader in Punjab Assembly Hamza Shahbaz has announced resisting the ‘haste’ being shown by the government in passing the bill, which has already been cleared by the standing committee within two days without holding any threadbare discussion on the important piece of legislation.

Samiullah Khan, a member of the PML-N’s core committee for Punjab Assembly affairs, told Dawn that except during budget sessions, it is for the first time in the parliamentary history of the provincial house the government has suspended rules to introduce its business on the private members day.

He said the opposition would try its best to prevent the government from what he said legislating on local bodies in violation of an earlier verdict of the Supreme Court.

He criticised the provincial assembly speaker for behaving like a `thanedar’ (station house officer) as during the nine months of Chaudhry Parvez Elahi’s speakership, MPAs had been suspended twice unlike in any other elected house of the country.

He said that if given a chance by the chair the PML-N would try to amend the proposed law for ensuring that it didn’t go against the apex court judgment.

Published in Dawn, April 30th, 2019