KARACHI: The privilege motion against leader of the opposition by sole MMA legislator at Sindh Assembly evoked an instant aggressive reaction from PTI, GDA and MQM’s MPAs that was considered an attempt to intimidate the mover.

Rasheed tabled a privilege motion to criticise the PTI MPA Firdous Shamim Naqvi who is also leader of the opposition, for abusive remarks of the latter against the former and the TLP lawmakers which it declared against the norms of the legislature. It termed the opposition leader’s remarks as contempt of electoral mandate and sought an apology from Firdous.

The motion stated the remarks violated Rasheed’s privilege as member of the assembly and therefore the house should act in accordance with the Assembly’s rules.

As soon as lawmaker from Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal Syed Abdul Rasheed stood up to make a point on that motion, the legislators from GDA, MQM and PTI rushed to his chair which hastened the ruling PPP MPAs to immediately come close to Rasheed to shield him in view of possible harm apprehended to be caused to him.

The MMA’s MPA continued his speech but it was nearly inaudible because of noisy protest by the three opposition parties’ members who gathered in front of the speaker’s chair and raised slogans.

Leader of the opposition who is from PTI and speaker Aga Siraj Durrani, who originally belong to PPP, exchanged harsh words. The speaker made clear that he would not let anyone to carry out intimidation in the house. Rasheed finished his speech and requested the house to adopt his move. With a clear support from the ruling PPP, the house passed his privilege motion. The house formed a six-member committee headed by Ghulam Qadir Chandio to probe the incident.

Later, speaking to the newsmen, Rasheed said his party was weighing options to reply to the intimidators legally and submitting another privilege motion at the assembly secretariat for the ‘attack’ on him in the house. He nominated Arsalan Taj Hussain, Adeel Ahmed, Bilal Ahmed, Raja Azhar Khan, Muhammad Ali Aziz and Muhammad Hussain Khan for ‘attacking’ him with threats against life and harm. He said this attitude of public representatives against another public representative was alarming and those MPAs had damaged sanctity of the house and the parliamentary traditions. His adjournment motion seeks action against the nominated lawmakers of the opposition. He said he had sought footage from the assembly to see who actually assaulted him. He said he would go to fight his case legally in the house and outside.