Barbs flew in the Senate on Friday with the opposition taking the government to task over its policies and demanding a parliamentary probe into “institutional overreach” and “election fraud”.
In response, the government accused the opposition of committing “economic terrorism” while also chiding it for the Results Transmission System (RTS) fiasco in the 2018 general polls.
Speaking on a calling-attention notice, PTI’s Ali Zafar said Parliament had been made irrelevant and meaningless.
His speech was interrupted several times by the members of the treasury benches, who loudly objected to his remarks.
“Matters pertaining to the country’s economy, security and foreign policy are not brought before Parliament; [instead] decisions are taken in drawing rooms,” he said, regretting that even agreements linked to the country’s future were signed while keeping Parliament in the dark.
“This is a betrayal of the constitutional concept of civilian supremacy,” he asserted. Noting that all the lawmakers were under oath to protect the Constitution, he called for regaining lost civilian space.
“Will this Senate remain a rubber stamp or will it rise to face the storm? Let us ensure that the law is not merely the law of the powerful but the law of the land,” he remarked.
He termed the incumbent government a “house built on sand”, saying it was bound to collapse.
The PTI parliamentary leader also raised alarm over what he called the “economic slaughter” of the people of Pakistan.
“Inflation is not a mere statistic or economic indicator. It is a sword hanging over the head of every citizen,” he said. The PTI leader further said that public debt was not just increasing, it was also ensuring that future generations would wear the “shackles of slavery”.
“This government survives only on debt … they are not here to distribute progress, they are here to distribute misery,” he said, pointing out that public debt had risen to Rs80 trillion.
In his speech, Zafar also said that the country’s laws were being weaponised.
“Cases are not being filed, they are being manufactured. A court case has become a punishment itself. This is political victimisation which is destroying the last remnants of public trust in the state,” he asserted.
Zafar said the consequences of this were visible in the country’s foreign policy.
“We have abandoned our principled stance on Kashmir,” he said, pointing out that Pakistan did not have a clear position on Venezuela or Iran.
He demanded that a special parliamentary committee be constituted to investigate the serious allegations of election fraud and “institutional overreach”. He also said the House should pass a resolution rejecting the government’s policies that crush the country’s poor and deepen inequality.
In response to Zafar’s speech, Minister of State for Finance Bilal Azhar Kayani sharply criticised the economic policies pursued by the PTI government between 2018 and 2022, saying repeated policy failures during that period pushed millions of Pakistanis below the poverty line and brought the country to the brink of default.
He said the past PTI-government changed four finance ministers, noting that while an International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme was initially rejected, it was later accepted on weak terms and eventually sabotaged for political reasons.
Kayani alleged that when the PTI- led government realised it was losing power, it deliberately undermined the IMF agreement despite being aware that such actions could push the country towards default.
The minister said the present government, after assuming office, took difficult but necessary decisions to revive the IMF programme, rebuild trust with international partners and avert sovereign default.
Kayani also said the PTI should apologise to the nation for their repeated attempts to push Pakistan towards default and trying to derail the IMF programme.