Daily Times

LAHORE: Heated arguments were exchanged once again between the opposition and treasury benches in Punjab Assembly on Friday when a lawmaker of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Uzma Kardar moved an out-of-turn resolution lauding the ‘success’ of federal government on diplomatic fronts.

As per the details, Uzma Kardar moved the resolution saying that the United States had to take back the name of Pakistan from the list of countries with religious sanctions as our foreign office launched strong protest while summoning the US officials to the foreign office.

“Pakistan ensures the rights of minorities while the national commission for human rights is completely functional here and therefore Pakistan doesn’t need to take dictation from any country regarding the rights of minorities,” she said in her resolution. The seats for minorities in all provincial and national assemblies are reserved here and this house prays for more successes of Pakistan on diplomatic fronts, the resolution concluded.

The resolution was strongly opposed by the opposition benches and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s (PML-N) Azma Bukhari said that how could one claim that we have achieved successes as Pakistan has faced several incidents of embarrassment on diplomatic fronts since the PTI’s government took the reins.

“We had to face embarrassment when the office of Prime Minister Imran Khan misinterpreted the phone call received by the French president and the list is very long where the government committed severe blunders on diplomatic fronts,” she added.

She was of the opinion that the government of PM Imran Khan has nothing to do with the withdrawal of Pakistan from the list of countries with religious sanction as it was a U-Turn by US President Donald Trump because the U-turn government is there in the US also as we have here in Pakistan these days. PML-N’s Waris Kallu also stood at his seat as he wanted to talk on the resolution but law minister Raja Basharat intervened at that point while addressing the Chair and said that it is against the rules to have a general debate over the resolution.

After managing to get the floor, Waris Kallu, a Member of Provincial Assembly from Khushab also criticised the diplomacy of our government in US.

“Religious minorities are facing severe hardships in India as we saw the massacre of Muslims in Indian Gujrat but still India didn’t appear on the list of countries with religious sanctions and we were there on that list despite protecting our minorities,” said Kallu while adding that it is the success of Indian diplomacy. The slogans of ‘shame shame’ were chanted from the treasury benches when Kallu talked about the success of Indian diplomacy. He further added that how can we claim to achieve the success on diplomatic front keeping in view that our foreign minister was received by an officer of deputy secretary rank during his visit to the US.

Both the minister of Public Prosecution Chaudhry Zaheeruddin and law minister Raja Basharat condemned the remarks of Kallu regarding the Indian diplomacy. Raja Basharat said on the occasion that it is the very success of federal government that the name of Pakistan was taken back from the list of countries with religious sanctions. The resolution was later passed with the majority of votes in the house.

The session was delayed for two hours from its scheduled time with Deputy Speaker Sardar Dost Muhammad Mazari in the chair. Punjab Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi decided to constitute a committee of the house in order to bring amendments to the rules of procedures regarding the production orders of arrested members under the supervision of Basharat. The committee will have the representation of three members from PTI, two members from PML-N and one each from Pakistan People’s Party and Rah-e-Haq party.

The session was later prorogued for indefinite time period.

Published in Daily Times, December 15^th 2018.