ISLAMABAD: Political rivals in the National Assembly overcame on Thursday divisions over budget and other issues to jointly authorise the house speaker to name an all-party parliamentary committee to recommend electoral reforms to remove “shortcomings of previous elections”.

The move, following consultations behind the scenes for days, came at the end of a day that saw an otherwise smooth approval of all the government demands for grants in the new budget tarnished by the conduct of a junior minister, who had to be led out of the house by his colleagues to prevent him from having a physical clash with one or more opposition lawmakers.

The authorisation for an electoral reforms committee was a follow-up of a June 10 letter Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had written to Speaker Ayaz Sadiq to constitute, with the house’s approval, a committee tasked “to evaluate shortcomings of previous elections” and recommend reforms to “ensure that elections are held in a free, fair and transparent manner”.

The move comes amid a continuing agitation by the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), the second largest opposition party in the National Assembly, against what it calls large-scale rigging in the 2013 general elections and threatened protests by the Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) of the famous Canada-based religious scholar Allama Tahirul Qadri against the present system as a whole.

A motion moved by Science and Technology Minister Zahid Hamid – who said it had the consent of all 10 parties present in the house, including the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N), and opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and PTI – authorised the speaker to constitute, in consultation with the chairman of the Senate and leaders of parliamentary parties in the lower house, the committee comprising members from “all parliamentary parties in proportion to their representation in parliament”.

“The speaker may replace any member of the committee on request of the leader of the parliamentary party concerned,” it said.

Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2014