Parliament’s special panel to discuss tweaks to Constitution today

ISLAMABAD: A meeting of the Special Committee of Parliament has been summoned in the Parliament House here on Friday (today) to hold discussion on the proposed constitutional amendments. According to sources, the meeting to be chaired by Syed Khursheed Shah, would also be attended by parliamentarians of PMLN, PPP and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Pakistan (JUIP) and other parties.

PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and PTI parliamentarians Asad Qaisar and Aamir Dogar have also been invited to attend the fifth in-camera meeting of the special parliamentary committee.

The sources said that Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar, PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and the opposition leader Omar Ayub Khan are also expected to attend what could be the decisive meeting. Meanwhile, two senior PPP parliamentarians, Dr Sherry Rehman and Syed Naveed Qamar, held a separate meeting with the JUIP chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman at his residence on Thursday night. Both the sides discussed matters related to the constitutional amendment.

Later, talking informally to newsmen, Sherry Rehman said PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari would contact all the parties on the issue of the amendment bill. Asked as to why the PPP leadership was approaching JUIP top leader time and again, she said that they wanted to develop a consensus of all the political parties on the important issue.

She told another questioner that the PPP would place its proposed draft of the amendment in the meeting of the Special Committee of Parliament on Friday.