THE message that has been broadcast from Islamabad in recent days is troubling. Even as political historians, legal experts, and rights activists cried themselves hoarse, warning legislators not to make what most observers fear will prove to be catastrophic mistakes, neither the Senate nor the National Assembly have displayed much interest in listening to reason and good sense. In both Houses, lawmakers have voted in haste to pass problematic legislation ahead of the impending dissolution of the incumbent government. One such piece of legislation was the bill quietly introduced last week to amend the Official Secrets Act. In it were provisions that would have given intelligence agencies immunity and legal cover for several practices that are violative of human rights and that have been roundly denounced in the past. The bill quickly sailed through the National Assembly before its details were brought to public attention. After widespread outcry and condemnation, which saw some of the more level-headed among our senators demand greater scrutiny of the text of the bill originally passed and to hold it till it had been appropriately debated and discussed, the government seems to have made some significant revisions. On Sunday, this updated bill was approved by the Upper House. However, the fact that it continued to be hotly contested on the Senate floor even after it was passed suggests that the revision process had not been followed in true spirit. The bill was subsequently returned to the Lower House, where the amendments suggested were also passed without the usual debate and deliberation. Only the president now stands in the way of the bill becoming an act of parliament. It is hoped that he will return it for further reconsideration, if needed, instead of simply acting as a rubber stamp.

The PTI era saw parliament rendered irrelevant while the government executed its legislative agenda through ordinances. Whatever hope there was that its follies would not be repeated by the more ‘mature’ parties has long since been lost. What we have recently seen is parliament undermining itself, and the legislative process being misused to take more and more power away from the public representatives entrusted with exercising it. This is deeply problematic, as legislative power is a trust reposed by the public in the representatives they send to parliament. It should never be exercised without adequate transparency and accountability.

Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2023