ISLAMABAD, June 16: A ruling party member on Saturday criticised the intelligence agencies’ role in political affairs on the fifth day of the National Assembly’s budget debate, which was marred by absenteeism.

Some two dozen members from opposition and treasury benches took part in the dull debate that lasted for about seven hours. Lack of interest in the proceedings was evident from the fact that not more than 60 members were present in the 342-member house at any given time during the session. Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz also attended the session briefly.

However, opposition members avoided pointing out the quorum problem because of an understanding reached with the government before the debate’s start. At one time, there were only eight members — four each from treasury and opposition benches — present in the house.

Rehana Aleem Mashhadi of the ruling PML criticised the intelligence agencies and said that instead of doing their original job, intelligence agency officials were chasing politicians. The PML MNA said that politicians’ should be held accountable through elections and not by intelligence agencies.

Expressing grief over the May 12 killings in Karachi, the PML lawmaker, in an apparent allusion to PML’s coalition partner in Sindh, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), said people responsible for the incident should be punished even if the ‘Ladlas (darlings) of Karachi’ were found to be involved in it.

Ms Mashhadi, elected on a women’s special seat on the PML-Chattha ticket, questioned the loyalty of supporters of President Gen Pervez Musharraf and said whenever he was in trouble, there was no one to defend him. She called for altering this trend and said such incidents had happened several times in the past.

Earlier, Maulana Merajuddin from South Waziristan criticised the government for carrying out a military operation in tribal areas and said that it was done on the orders of the US.

He said that heads of women killed in the bombings were still being displayed, hanging from trees in the mountains of South Waziristan. “Bodies of people, who are today supporting the US and anti-Islamic forces, will also hang in a similar fashion in every square in the country,” he warned. The MNA said people in tribal areas wanted development but not at the cost of their dignity, honour and human lives. He urged the rulers to stop supporting the US to save the country’s integrity.

Shahid Bhutto of the People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) accused the army of usurping power in the name of accountability and said it resorted to what he termed ‘economic terrorism’. Accusing the government of selling national strategic assets at throwaway prices, he said that the scandalous way in which the Pakistan Steel Mills and PTCL had been privatised and scams of sugar, cement and oil prices were some of the examples of the present government’s ‘economic terrorism’.