Opposition’s limited presence: Govt pushes five bills through Senate

ISLAMABAD: The opposition uproar and walkout in the Senate on Friday marred the proceedings, as the government managed to push through five bills, taking advantage of the opposition senators’ limited presence in the House.

PPP parliamentary leader Sherry Rehman strongly agitated against the taking up of supplementary agenda and insisted the bills passed after voting on the two bills listed on the orders of the day was a bulldozed legislation, having no value.

After the question hour on the last day of the current session, the opposition opposed FATF-related the Mutual Legal Assistance (Criminal Matters) (Amendment) Bill, 2021 when Chairman Senate Muhammad Sadiq Sanjrani sought the leave of the House to allow introduction of the bill.

But the opposition faced a defeat with 43 votes of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) led ruling alliance in favour of the bill and 33 votes were polled against it on the eventful day, plunging the House in pandemonium, as the opposition faced second back to back defeat, this time during voting on the ‘controversial’ the Federal Medical Teaching Institute Bill, 2020 after the government introduced it through a supplementary agenda. After this, it staged a protest walkout from the House.

The Senate, however, passed two other bills with some calm, including the Members of Parliament (Salaries and Allowances) (Amendment) Bill, 2021 and the Regulation of Generation, Transmission and Distribution of Electric Power (Amendment) Bill, 2021 but with the reservations of Senator Mushtaq Ahmad and Senator Mian Raza Rabbani respectively.

PPP Senator Rabbani said that a controversial amendment had been made in the law on the insistence of international lenders that if the government did not notify the power tariff within the stipulated time frame, then the authority would be able to notify it on its own.

While on the Mutual Legal Assistance (Criminal Matters) (Amendment) Bill, the House rejected all amendments proposed by Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) Senator Mushtaq Ahmad, who contended that they wanted that Pakistan should get out of the Grey List of Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global anti-money laundering watchdog, but the law violated the basic fundamental rights of citizens.

Calling the day as the black day in the parliamentary history, he said the government could take action against a person by confiscating his property made through alleged money laundering etc.

He also alleged that the government was paving way for the release of Dr Shakeel Afridi and Indian spy Kulbhushan Jadhav through the proposed bill but the accusation was rejected by the government later.

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Senator Saadia Abbasi did not press for her amendments on the bill but raised her reservations by saying that any bill passed by the House should not be repugnant to the law and the Constitution.

She said, “We want that the government shouldn’t provide information about the citizen (to any other country) without his criminal conviction and the person affected by any decision (regarding offences about the bill) should be issued notice”.

PTI Senator Mohsin Aziz, responding to the opposition’s concerns, said the bill stopped way of ‘money launderers and thieves, arguing that if demand of prior notice was to be met by the opposition, then any person would transfer all his ill-gotten money and properties under question to names of his other family members.

“We want that Pakistan would go back in the White List of FATF,” he maintained.

The opposition severely launched protest when Advisor to the Prime Minister on Parliamentary Affairs Babar Awan introduced the Federal Medical Teaching Institutes 2020 bill, already passed by the National Assembly, through a supplementary agenda. But the government defeated the opposition with its 39 votes against 35 votes on the leave to move the bill in the House. The bill provides to ‘reorganize the federal medical teachings institutes and teaching hospitals’.

When the chair put the bill to voice vote, the opposition started raising slogans and gathered in front of the chairman Senate with Senator Rabbani asking the Secretariat staff as to why the supplementary agenda was not provided to them before the bill was moved.

Another bill under the supplementary agenda: the Reorganisation of the National Institute of Health (Amendment) Bill was also passed.

To this, chairman Senate reacted to Rabbani and told him to have a seat, saying “please! You can snub me but not the staff.” He stressed that the supplementary agenda had been provided to them on the table. The advisor also said that the government could move the supplementary agenda under the rules and it was its prerogative.

Leader of the House Dr. Shahzad Waseem also said there was nothing new about supplementary agenda and defeat of the opposition on head count, as the treasury also had faced such situations.

PPP Senator Rubina Khalid believed that the purpose of the bill was to introduce a new health system in the country on the pattern of US where only those got free health facility who had an insurance policy.

Leader of the House Dr Shahzad Waseem rejected her claim and said that the bill was part of the health reform programme of PTI. It seeks to provide such health facilities to the poor which only affluent class can afford.

PPP Senator Sherry Rehman said that the atmosphere of the House had been polluted despite the fact it had been making constructive legislation.

She remarked that the sanctity of the House had been breached by circulating supplementary agenda after voting.

“The House cannot run like this. This regime of abuses does not want to listen to us. Chairman Sahib you have taken up supplementary agenda after voting on earlier bills. What is the use of the standing committees and being part of the Parliament?” she asked.

On the Members of Parliament (Salaries and Allowances) (Amendment) Bill 2021, the mover Senator Sarfraz Ahmed Bugti told the House that the proposed law was not about increase in the perks, privileges and salaries of the lawmakers rather some procedural changes had been made to make the process easy about issuance of air tickets and allocation of travel allowance to the lawmakers.

Speaking on his calling attention notice regarding the deteriorating law and order situation in the country, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, ANP Senator Hidayat Ullah Khan said people in general and business community, in particular was extremely concerned about the law and order in Peshawar.

He continued that despite offering massive sacrifices, the province was again facing unrest while crimes and killing spree was on after restoration of peace some years back.

He explained that Peshawar was facing an alarming situation, as this year in just three months there had been an increase of 65 per cent in crimes while in June alone, 64 persons were murdered, 14 in a day, and seven belonged to one family.

The ANP senator also talked about other issues and condemned the latest increase in oil prices and called for its immediate reversal, saying people were already facing hardest times owing to inflation.

Like him, State Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan spoke on the situation in Afghanistan, strategic depth and that the police, the army and other state institutions were on one page against terrorism and would not let it return to the country.

He said India had been plotting to destabilize Pakistan through terrorism and sowing seeds of sectarianism but the government would not allow its nefarious designs to succeed.

He added that Pakistan had no favorites in Afghanistan and it would extend a hand of friendship, whosoever was installed in Kabul.

MQM-Pakistan Senator Faisal Ali Sabzwari, through a calling attention notice, drew the attention of Minister for Interior towards what he called fake CNICs issued by Nadra to terrorists, banned outfits and foreign nationals.

Quoting director FIA Sindh, he said 50-60 Nadra officers and employees were involved in issuance of fake CNICs to banned outfits, NDS and other anti-Pakistan agencies and their agents as well as Afghans and Bengalese and verification was done by political people in the province.

Senator Sabzwari claimed that 3-4 million had been added to the voter lists, as any person of 18 years of age, getting CNIC, got automatically included in the voter list. He called for taking to task those behind this practice, firing Nadra employees and cleansing of voter lists of fake CNIC holders.

Minister Ali Muhammad responded by categorically denying the statistics and said in the last four years, over 2.9 million CNICs were issued and explained the procedure in this connection, ruling out the possibility of issuance of 3-4 million cards.

He added that the figure quoted here was a slip of tongue. He said the Nadra was fully vigilant and issuing the computerized national identification cards after the proper scrutiny of papers and documentation.

However, he did not rule out the possibility of issuance of fake CNICs in the past but in a very limited numbers and noted a DG was made OSD and FIRs were filed against ten others. However, on the mover’s request, the matter was referred to the House committee concerned by the chair.

The House also adopted a condolence resolution in connection with the passing away of the former president Mamnoon Hussain; it was moved by PML-N Senator Azam Nazir Tarar.