PTI announces boycotting vote in National Assembly, Senate for legal reform

ISLAMABAD: The political committee of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Sunday announced that it would be boycotting the voting process for the 26th constitutional amendment set to be tabled by the incumbent government and its allies in the national Assembly and the Senate today.

“The group occupying the [lower and upper] Houses has no moral, democratic and constitutional justification to change the Constitution. Enforcing the law of the jungle via constitutional tweaks is equivalent to burying the democracy [for good],” read the statement issued by the former ruling party’s political committee.

The Imran Khan-founded party’s decision comes as the federal cabinet will hold another sitting at 2:30pm to review and approve the final draft of the contentious 26th constitutional amendment followed by sessions of the upper and lower houses which are scheduled to take place at 3pm and 6pm, respectively.

The coalition government was initially set to present the legislation on Saturday but decided to defer it at the request of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman who said that his party would be able to cast its votes in favour of the 26th constitutional amendment after receiving a response from the PTI.

The issue has rather been engulfed in ambiguity and uncertainty and has been subjected to severe opposition from the PTI which has time again expressed concerns over the prospective judiciary-oriented legislation provisioning a fixed three-year term of the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP), establishment of constitutional benches, restructuring of the Supreme Judicial Council, and the formation of a special Special Parliamentary Committee which will suggest names from amongst the three most senior judges of the apex court for the CJP’s appointment.

A day earlier, Maulana Fazl — while holding a joint presser with PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari — said that the JUI-F had reached a consensus on the constitutional package after the government agreed to remove all those parts which were not acceptable to them, adding that now no major point of difference existed between his party and the ruling coalition.

However, in its statement today, the PTI’s political committee reiterated the party’s resolve to resist the prospective legal reforms and said protests would be held outside the residences of those lawmakers who would take part in voting in the lower and upper houses of parliament.

“The NA and Senate members [attending the sessions] are bound to abide by the party policy and the PTI founder’s instructions. The PTI workers will hold sit-ins in front of the lawmakers’ houses who will take part in the voting process,” it warned.

Meanwhile, sources have told Geo News that another round of talks will be held between the PTI and the JUI-F wherein the former’s delegation will visit Fazl’s residence.

There will be a final consultation between the two parties on the legal reforms, during which the former ruling party will apprise the JUI-F head of the party’s stance on the matter, the sources added.