ISLAMABAD - Speaker National Assembly Sardar Ayaz Sadiq is unduly making the issue of PTI Parliamentarians resignations complex, otherwise in the light of the Supreme Court of Pakistan’s judgment handed down in a case in 1976 and rules of procedure and conduct of business of National Assembly empower him to decide the matter using his authority.
Legal and constitutional experts, commenting on the stance taken by the Speaker on verification of resignations as a bit rigid, said that the Speaker could use other ways and means to confirm that the resignations tendered by PTI MPs were given under any duress or not.
Some Parliamentarians including Maulana Fazlur Rehman and Aftab Ahmad Khan Sherpao were critical over the undue laxity shown by the Speaker in accepting the resignations and said that if they (PTI MPs) were reluctant to appear before him in person to verify their resignations the Speaker could use other sources to confirm the genuineness of these resignations.
Commenting on the situation, veteran Parliamentarian and constitutional expert S. M. Zafar said that the Supreme Court of Paksitan’s ruling given in a case in 1976 fully empowered Speaker National Assembly that in the given situation when the PTI MPs were not appearing before him in person to verify their resignations he (Speaker) could use other sources to confirm the validity and genuineness of these resignations.
He further said that as he appeared before the Supreme Court in that particular case in 1976 so he was in clear picture about the authority of Speaker National Assembly regarding the verification of resignation of some MP through other sources in case the member refused to turn up in person to conform his resignation before him.
To a question, Zafar further said that Speaker could not delay the matter of acceptance of resignation of any member for longer period because keeping the matter in limbo for long would deprive the constituents of that particular constituency of representation in the Parliament, which is against the spirit of constitution.
Constitutional experts seeing weight in the contention of the PTI leadership suspected that the idea behind calling their MPs for verification of their resignations in groups was to accept their resignations on different dates so that the by-polls on these vacated seats would be held on different dates instead of same day.
The PTI leadership was also charging the government with using various tactics including luring PTI MPs with various incentives to backtrack from their resignations and the reason to call their MPs in groups was also aimed at making them defect from their collective decision of stepping down from their membership of lower house of the Parliament.
Zafar said that there is no bar if all the PTI MPs could appear en masse before the Speaker National Assembly to confirm their resignation but so far no such move is on the cards from PTI side as they also wanted to keep the matter in confusion and would unlikely appear before the Speaker, a source in the PTI informed.
Sources aware of the background developments taking place on this front informed The Nation that actually the delay in acceptance of the resignations of the PTI MPs is being made by Speaker National Assembly on the request of Political Jirga members who wanted some more time to resolve the political standoff between the PTI and government through negotiations.
But in their last interaction a couple of days back Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq in a meeting with Political Jirga leaders Sirajul Haq, Rehman Malik and Mir Hasil Bizenjo had made it clear that he would not delay the matter further and would proceed further as per rules while dealing with the resignations of the PTI MPs.
But on the other hand sources in ruling party informed that the Speaker has already given much time to the PTI MPs and by calling the PTI Chairman on Oct. 13 he has given another fortnight to both government and Political Jirga to resolve the political imbroglio through negotiations.