When the reps lose patience

Tuesday was the second consecutive day in the National Assembly when the galleries witnessed members losing patience while taunting, blaming, and alleging each other as if the lower House was reflecting Pakistan's societal portrayal at present. When the elected representatives of the people, irrespective of their parties and political ideologies if there are any, are failing to behave in a parliamentary manner inside the Parliament, what to anticipate of the general public? Point scoring was the name of the game in entirety of the domestic politics these days. On the other day, the PPP and the PML-N members had yelled at each other, while MQM and 'N' members were making each other's mockery on Tuesday. Citizens' life from Karachi to FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas) was insecure chiefly due to simple failure of the federal as well as the provincial governments, while Interior Minister Abdul Rehman Malik advised media not to take rival political statements even on the Karachi situation as seriously. In the same length of breath, he said, that all the law enforcement agencies from armed forces to down the line were at high alert. But in capacity of Federal Interior Minister he afforded this complacency to say that the law and order was a provincial subject. Still he took the taunt of Opposition Leader Nisar Ali Khan that he made about him in his absence on Monday as quite seriously. Talking to media outside the Parliament House, he cared to respond to a Khan's pertinent taunt that he had made with between the lines reference to a local joke about monkeys moving from one tree to another without any particular purpose. "Believe me my friends I never intended to express some kind of 'smartness' that has been attributed to me the other day," Malik said in explaining his position viz a viz state of security across the country particularly in Karachi. Malik could occupy the stage outside the Gate No 1 of the Parliament House because the members of the MQM had to take go ahead from the top leadership before going to the media over the issue inside the NA hall. And standards of politics have gone so low, that the issue between the two parties namely PML-N and the MQM, on Tuesday as well, was making mockery of each other's leadership. Just look at them. What else one could say? The country is suffering acute problems like lack of security, energy, and economic and employment opportunities while the elected representatives were looking for chances to settle score against each other. Ironically, these political conflicts on ground were all superficial and having no direct relation with the burning issues of the country.

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