The Balochistan Assembly (BA) on Friday passed unanimously a resolution demanding of President Pervez Musharraf to seek vote of confidence from his electoral college or step down immediately. The joint resolution, which is considered to be a step towards impeachment of the President, was adopted as 58 legislators out of 65 members of the house voted for it and no member opposed the resolution.
PML-Q woman legislator and Balochistan Minister for Law Rubina Irfan presented the resolution before the house. Speaker Muhammad Aslam Bhutani presided over the assembly session. PML-Q parliamentary leader Shaikh Jaffar Mandokhel, PML-Q legislators Tariq Masuri, Sardar Masood Luni, Nasreen Khethran, and the only opposition member in BA Sardar Yar Muhammad Rind, PPP lawmaker Ameen Umrani, and BNP-A legislator Asghar Rind did not turn up in the voting session of the house which met to adopt the anti-Musharraf resolution. Excluding Ameen Umrani and Tariq Massuri, the five other absentees (including Sardar Rind as MNA) had voted the President in the presidential election in November last.
The house had suspended the concerned sub-rule of Rules of Procedures for tabling the resolution for its passage. The resolution cited the following grounds for quitting the President from his office.
1) President Pervez Musharraf has violated and subverted the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan twice by holding it in abeyance, and policies pursued by him damaged the democratic transition in the country.
2) The President is a symbol of federation in accordance with the terms of Article 41 (1) of the Constitution, but he violated the sanctity of his office and created disharmony among the federating units and paralysed the federation due to his flawed policies, due to which the people have lost confidence over the institutions. Besides, he brought sense of despondencies among the federating units.
3) The flawed policies pursued by the President during the last eight years have brought the country into political crisis and economic impasse.
4) The President launched illegitimate military operation in Balochistan and he is responsible for assassinating veteran Baloch politician Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti and killing thousands of other Baloch people and kept hundreds of Baloch, Pashtoon and other Balochistanis, in detention without formally charged.
5) The house deems President Pervez Musharraf as unfit to continue to hold the office of the President. The resolution demanded of the President to seek vote of confidence from his electoral college and if he fails to get vote of confidence, it demanded of the parliament to issue a notice of impeachment under the Article 47 of the Constitution.
They demanded of the President to resign and step down from his office, adding if the President fails to quit his office, then the parliament should impeach him under terms of Article 47 of the Constitution. Later, the Speaker read the order of Balochistan Governor Nawab Zulfiqar Ali Magsi who prorogued the assembly session under clause (b) of Article 109 of the Constitution.