Shikarpur tragedy: Talks with govt successful, protesters end sit-in

حکومت سندھ سے کامیاب مذاکرات کے بعد نمائش چورنگی پر دھرنا ختم کر دیا گیا دھرنے کے شرکاء مزار قائد پر حاضری کے بعد پرامن طور پر منتشر ہو گئے

Allama Maqsood Domki of Shuhada Committee on Thursday announced to end sit-in after a 37-hour protest in Karachi. He pronounced that the negations with Sindh government were fruitful and that they have been ensured that the government would employ all possible resources to hamper such incidents in future. Provincial government also ascertained to forward the case of Shikarpur tragedy to the military courts while a Judicial Investigation Team (JIT) will be formulated to thoroughly investigate the incident.

Row in NA over ‘fightback’ by President Zardari

ISLAMABAD: The government and the opposition crossed swords over a perceived political fightback by President Asif Ali Zardari at the start of a National Assembly session on Monday after both sides agreed to put off a debate on Karachi violence until Wednesday.

Strangely, at least two members of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) from Karachi walked out of the house to protest over the handling of the situation in the country’s commercial capital where more than 35 people had been killed in four days of violence until Sunday.

Opposition leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan initiated the move to postpone the debate because of the absence of Interior Minister Rehman Malik due to his prolonged presence in Karachi, to which he objected, after Deputy Speaker Faisal Karim Kundi had fixed the last two hours of the sitting to discuss the situation as demanded by two opposition adjournment motions.

But Mr Khan later used a point of order to lash out at what he saw as the president’s talk of danger to him from undemocratic forces, alleged threats for the use of the so-called “Sindh card” in his defence and recent resolutions passed by the provincial assemblies of Sindh, the NWFP and Balochistan expressing confidence in Mr Zardari.

However Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Babar Awan came out with an equally rhetorical rejoinder to the opposition leader’s tirade against recent speeches made by the president in an apparent move to counter a hostile propaganda campaign against him and alleged threats from unspecified non-parliamentary sources.

The minister particularly defended the resolutions of the provincial assemblies which he said had supported an elected leader rather than a dictator or somebody like the ancient Roman emperor Nero to whose fabled fiddling (when Rome was burning) Mr Khan had referred while speaking of the president’s moves. “There is a difference between Nero and a hero.”

Mr Awan dismissed allegation that the president sought to use “Sindh card” in his defence, saying the PPP had no such desire and pointed out that the party not only led the coalition governments in the centre and Sindh and Balochistan but was also a coalition partner in Punjab and the NWFP.

The opposition leader said his Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) would not be a party to any move for confidence resolutions in the Punjab Assembly, where it is the majority party, or in the National Assembly and the Senate, where it sits on opposition benches. But he said he would be the first person to support the president if he came to parliament to expose the alleged “danger from undemocratic forces” and “if it were true what he said”.

Mr Awan did not say if Mr Zardari would make such a disclosure, but told the house that president would come to parliament and “take you into confidence” in a mandatory address at the start of the new parliamentary year on March 16.

Earlier, the chair allocated the last two hours of the day to discuss the Karachi situation after Mr Awan announced “no objection” to the adjournment motions moved by PML-Q’s Marvi Memon and PML-N’s Birjees Tahir and said that the debate could be wound up by the interior minister on his return due on Tuesday.

But the opposition leader, disagreeing with his own party member Birjees Tahir for an immediate debate, said his side would agree to it if Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani could sit through the two-hour proceedings, otherwise the house must wait for the presence of the interior minister.

After Mr Babar’s consultations with leaders of all parliamentary groups and a suggestion from the prime minister that the house must wait for an inquiry report in possession of the interior minister, the debate was put off to Wednesday because it could not be held on a private members’ day on Tuesday.

PPP MEMBERS’ IRE: Later speaking on points of order, PPP’s Abdul Qadir Patel surprised the house by staging a walkout after alleging a discriminatory operation by Rangers in Lyari area and saying it would be wrong to portray all Pathans as Taliban, Baloch as drug mafia and Sindhis as land-grabbers and demanding action against all those against whom first information reports (FIRs) had been registered.

He questioned the interior minister’s right to decide “who is a PPP member and who is not” in Karachi as he was not the party chairman.

He was followed by party member Sher Mohammad Baloch who complained that PPP MNAs from Karachi were excluded from and those of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement were invited to a PPP-MQM meeting held on Sunday to discuss the issue.

Another PPP member from Sindh, Nawab Yousuf Talpur, also went out of the house in apparent sympathy with the walkout, but returned afterwards, although, despite the chair’s request to some ministers to bring them back, his other colleagues were not seen in the house before it was adjourned until 10am on Tuesday.

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