The Speaker National Assembly should not have blocked adjournment and privilege motions of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) by giving a ruling on them while sitting in his chamber. Speaking to media persons outside the Parliament House, PTI leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi said this, adding his party wanted to highlight contradictions in Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's statements that he delivered in the National Assembly and submitted with the Supreme Court, but Speaker Ayaz Sadiq didn't allow them to speak on the matter.
He said the Speaker should not become a party to the issue; rather, he should play a neutral role to run proceedings of the House. "This is just a beginning of our agitation against the Speaker and we will mount it further in coming days," he added. Qureshi said it was the right of his party to speak on the paramount issue like the Panamagate in the National Assembly as the Prime Minister was clearly caught lying on the floor of the House.
He said his party would keep protesting both inside and outside the Parliament until the Speaker allows them to speak on the issue. "It is prerogative of the Speaker to give ruling on an issue, but he should have given this ruling in the National Assembly instead of in his chamber," he said. The PTI leader said that the ruling party wants to bulldoze the opposition through its majority in the National Assembly, but the PTI would not allow it to do this.
The PTI members including Shah Mahmood Qureshi and Jehangir Tareen kept hurling slogans against the government and Prime Minister Sharif outside the Parliament House. Earlier, speaking to media persons outside the Parliament House, Minister for Railways Khawaja Saad Rafique said the government is ready to initiate debate on the Panamagate issue in the National Assembly, but the opposition should first negotiate it with the government.
He said the opposition parties, especially the PTI, tried to hijack proceedings of the House by resorting to sloganeering. The minister also rejected that there was any contradiction in the statements of the Prime Minister on ownership of the flats in London, saying the Prime Minister's speech in the Parliament was more elaborate, while it was succinct in the Supreme Court.
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