Arrests on parliament’s premises termed ‘assault on democracy’
PTI senator hurls expletive at Vawda
PTI lawmaker Ali Muhammad Ali Khan delivered a fiery speech to condemn the arrest of his colleagues
A COUPLE of days on from the arrest of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Gohar Khan and other politicians from the premises of Parliament House in Islamabad, a majority of parliamentarians are describing the detentions as an “assault on the sanctity of Parliament”. In their speeches on the floor of National Assembly (NA) on Tuesday and Wednesday, many lawmakers characterised the raid in which the politicians were taken into custody as a “blot on the face of Pakistani democracy”. For his part, NA Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq ordered the suspension of five officers responsible for providing security at the Parliament House.
An order issued by the NA secretariat said that Sergeant-at-Arms Muhammad Ishfaq Ashraf had been suspended “with immediate effect for a period of 120 days”. The suspended officer would be entitled to draw pay and allowances as admissible under the applicable rules.
In a separate note, the suspension orders for Security Assistant Waqas Ahmed as well as three junior security assistants — Obaidullah, Muhammad Waheed Safdar and Muhammad Haroon — were issued. The four officials were also placed under suspension for four months.
According to sources, during “a raid” the suspended officials helped “some masked men in arresting” the PTI activists and sympathisers from the Parliament House, although it’s unclear exactly how all that came to pass.
In speeches they made on the floor of the house, the PTI and other opposition lawmakers took the government to task for the arrests, which took place in the wee hours of Tuesday. Ali Muhammad Khan of the PTI delivered a particularly hard-hitting speech in this regard.
He pointed out that some masked men had taken away some political leaders “illegally”. “This incident is not about Imran Khan or even PTI. This is an attack on democracy itself,” he added.
The former federal minister even suggested that all those who had ordered the arrests on the premises of Parliament House “should be tried for committing high treason under Article 6 of the Constitution”.
Members of the Pakistan People’s Party also condemned the controversial raid even though it is nominally an ally of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). Some PML-N lawmakers, too, said that lawmakers should not have been arrested from the premises of the House.
At the same time, however, they pointed out that when they were in opposition they were subjected to far worse treatment. They also chastised the PTI leaders for using “foul language” against the government as well as the establishment during their rally on the outskirts of Islamabad on Sunday night and for violating the provisions of a new law aimed at regulating public meetings and protests.
Former Federal Minister for Water Resources Faisal Vawda
Meanwhile, an ugly incident took place in the Senate that marred the proceedings of the upper house of parliament on Wednesday. In a fit of anger, Senator Falak Naz of the PTI hurled an expletive at Senator Faisal Vawda, who was once a member of Imran Khan’s party. This naturally infuriated the latter who demanded the suspension, even dismissal, of the PTI lawmaker for uttering the word “brothel” in her tirade against him.
He kept on insisting that strict action should be taken against the PTI senator even after Senate Chairman Yousuf Raza Gilani had expunged the word at the centre of the controversy from official records.