ISLAMABAD, Sept 1: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz had advised President Gen Pervez Musharraf to promulgate the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Ordinance, 2007, but the law has been lying on the president’s desk awaiting his assent for almost a week now.

It seems the issue is not a priority for the president hard-pressed by political engagements and perhaps oblivious to the fact that the government is left with just a day in the deadline set by the Supreme Court to promulgate the law.

A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry will resume on Sept 3 the hearing of a suo motu case regarding the sale of kidneys. At the last hearing, the court had directed the government to promulgate the ordinance within a month. The National Assembly is also likely to meet next week and the president cannot promulgate an ordinance when the NA is in session.

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz – under pressure from the civil society for delay in legislation on organs trade, particularly the government’s move to table the bill on the last day of the previous session of the assembly – had on Aug 27 advised the president to promulgate the ordinance.

Sources said the draft ordinance had already remained at the president’s secretariat from Feb 14 to April 3 after the cabinet had on Feb 7 referred the draft for fine-tuning to a committee comprising former law minister Wasi Zafar and Sharifuddin Pirzada, adviser to the prime minister.

During this period, the president’s secretariat had remained engaged in soliciting opinion on the law from various quarters.

Recommendations of Mr Zafar and Mr Pirzada were sent to the health ministry within days after the president’s secretariat returned the draft. To the surprise of many, the recommendations included several controversial clauses like compensation for donors and permission for selling organs to foreigners. The controversial insertions were removed after public outcry.