Scholars committee has apparently failed to evolve a consensual text for the Women's Protection Bill, to utter embarrassment of Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, who had brought this entity into form to give a face-saving opportunity to the MMA.
The MMA had burnt its boats by declaring that should the Women's Protection Bill be passed as approved by the house select committee its members would resign from all assemblies.
Perceiving that declaration as the beginning of the end of the present dispensation, the realpolitik master in him set up the scholars committee. The MMA sat with the committee but at the end there was no new report. Unless the truth in the matter is told officially it is believed that the committee had rejected the select committee-approved draft for the Women's Protection Bill. It means that Friday morning when the National Assembly met for its weekend sitting things were back to square one. Battle lines were now clearly drawn.
The bill will be tabled on Monday, said parliamentary affairs minister Sher Afgan, adding it will be passed as it is. He was quite assertive in saying so; his high decibel assertion perfectly matching Hafiz Hussain Ahmad's question moments before: where is the bill Sher Afgan had promised to table on September 7. Hafiz was in fact focussed at Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, who had just entered the house probably "after hearing Hafiz in his chamber".
Rising on a point of order, Hafiz Hussain Ahmad had ridiculed the decision of the house business committee according to which the present session was to end on August 31. The session was prolonged, in that "Sher Afgan had said that he would table the Women's Protection Bill on August 7. We had responded that he would not...Why does he (Pervez Musharraf) need the bill to take with him to the United States...He likes to address the tout assembly (of Afghanistan) but does not come here...We should be told how long this session would continue".
Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain had come to respond to Hafiz Hussain Ahmad to say that "curse be upon him, who will vote against Quran and Sunnah...The scholars are being consulted only on the point to ensure that there should be nothing against Quran and Sunnah in the bill", he added. Hafiz Hussain Ahmad promptly welcomed Shujaat's commitment that there would not be anything in the bill that would militate against Quran and Sunnah. At this point, Riaz Pirzada was on his feet to ask the chair to expunge whatever Shujaat had said with reference to Quran and Sunnah "because every sect has its own interpretation of Quran and Sunnah".
Differing perceptions about the Women's Protection Bill and how it would be enacted as obtain today throw up a very confusing picture of the voting pattern if and when it comes up for legislation. On one end of the spectrum stands the MMA, which says it would rather resign than vote for the bill as approved by the select committee, and on the other, the MQM, which says it would not accept any modification to it. While the PML-N stands with the MMA, the PPPP appears to be taking the side of the MQM in this respect. In between stands the confused mass of the PML-Q, although some of its members have privately expressed their independent views. But how things will turn up at the final stage is a matter of conjecture.
Apart from the bill that has the potential to explode the present ruling coalition, and even opposition, into new clusters and galaxies of political alignments and alliances, there was not much of interest in the proceedings. Yet the rules of running the business of the house were being set aside. Speaker Amir Hussain opened the proceedings pledging not to allow points of order but then did just the opposite. Given the option the members prefer speaking on points of order than going along the question hour. So even one of the briefest list of enlisted questions could not be finished. That was not to the liking of M.P. Bhandara, a stickler of rules.
Of course, some minor deviation from the rules is always accepted but not if 90 to 95 percent deviations take places, said a visibly upset Bhandara. "On this crossroads there are no signals, therefore, there would be accidents," he said and then charged that the house is being run in contravention of article 29 (3) of the Constitution. The said provision ordains each year the President in relation to the affairs of the federation and governors in relation to affairs of their provinces "shall cause to be prepared and laid before the National Assembly or the provincial assemblies" a report on the observance and implementation of the principles of policy...for discussion. That report has not come despite assurances by the chair, Bhandara said.
Bhandara also found fault with the working of the house in that it is being "bypassed" in more than one way. He said his resolution dated March 17, 2006 for "discussion" for a new province in southern Punjab has not been taken up while the same matter was debated for good 45 minutes on points of order. The 15-minute discussion on the Islamic Investment Bank on a point of order the other day was also in violation of rules, he said, adding the proper platform for that was a calling attention notice.
Speaker Amir Hussain did not respond to Bhandara, may be because he was suffering fits of anger like Nafisa Raja and Farooq Azam faced, albeit separately. "Don't waste time," he told Raja. The words for Farooq Azam were equally harsh but merit mentions given that they aptly place the two in their rural milieus. "Sit down. We are not standing in corn fields," said Amir Hussain, responding to the member's hark for attention. That, however, was not the norm. He rescued many ill-prepared state ministers by observing that fresh question be asked. The exception, however, was Minfal parliamentary secretary Rajab Ali Baloch, who comes to the house well-prepared, like Omar Ayub and Tanwir Hussain. The house will now meet on Monday afternoon.