Opposition MPAs oath-taking: Speaker wants KP Assembly session convened ‘properly’

PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly Speaker Babar Saleem Swati has said that he will not only take oath from the members elected on seats reserved for women and minorities but will also be happy to take group with them if the provincial government convened the assembly session.

At his maiden interaction with the parliamentary reporters at the KP Assembly, he said he could not summon the assembly session on his own under the rules but the provincial government or the opposition benches could requisite the session.

Avoiding questions related to the oath of 25 opposition MPAs elected on reserved seats and assembly session, he said he did not want to talk on the sub judice matters.

However, he added that the provincial government had not convened the assembly session, and if it summoned the house, he would be happy to have a group photo with the elected members after administering them oath as assembly members.

He said he had a good discussion in his meeting with the opposition leader in the KP Assembly last week.

It is worth mentioning here that a two-member bench of the Peshawar High Court had directed the KP Assembly speaker to summon the assembly session within 14 days and administer the oath to those members who had been declared successful by the Election Commission of Pakistan on seats reserved for women and minorities. But, the ruling Sunni Ittehad Council, joined by the independently elected members from Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, moved the Supreme Court against the verdict.

The present KP Assembly came into being after the February 08 general elections and held its first meeting on February 28, where the newly elected MPAs elected the speaker and deputy speaker and the leader of the House in the first session.

The assembly session was prorogued after the presidential elections.

The KP governor had convened the assembly session on March 22 but the speaker did not summon the session.

The assembly had not been in session and even the Senate polls were not held on April 02 for the stand-off over the 25 reserved seats allotted to the opposition benches which were claimed by SIC/PTI.

To a question, the speaker said he had ordered an inquiry into the visit of election staff to the KP Assembly premises for the Senate elections on April 02. He said the sanctity of the provincial assembly would be upheld at any cost.

Babar Saleem Swati, elected for the second consecutive time to the provincial assembly from Mansehra, said unfortunately we had inherited a system from the British that was fit for colonial rule.

“We had not achieved real independence, rather exploited the British-inherited system for furthering our vested interest,” he said. The speaker announced access of media to Public Account Committee meetings and suggested that representatives of the Press should participate in the PAC meeting so that the true picture should be presented to the public in print and electronic media.