A senator from treasury benches, Barrister Muhammad Ali Saif, on Thursday strongly put his weight behind General Pervez Musharraf (retd), saying that "no one is born in Pakistan to hang Pervez Musharraf," while contending that the former dictator did not abrogate the Constitution.
"He (Musharraf) did not do anything unconstitutional. Neither did he abrogate the Constitution nor did he commit treason. Those people who are dreaming that special court's verdict to grant him death sentence would be implemented are living in a fool's paradise.
This is not going to happen. No one in Pakistan has the courage to hang Musharraf," said Saif from Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) while speaking at the floor of the house during the Senate session.
"I have been hearing really lively speeches here in this house since Wednesday and it dawned upon me that all the ills and all the problems confronting our country since its creation in 1947 are due to Musharraf," the senator said while taking a jibe at the opposition in an implied vein.
"I found it extremely strange that those politicians and judges who extended their utmost support to Musharraf when he was in power are the ones to ridicule him now and blame him for all the problems Pakistan is currently having. They should be put to trial if Musharraf is to be tried."
The senator said the special court's verdict against Musharraf "would go down in the history as complete shame and abuse of judicial authority."
He said, "The derogatory words were used in the special court's verdict and our religion and social and ethical values do not allow this kind of treatment against anyone."
Saif said the elements who are supporting the special court's 'highly condemnable verdict' against Musharraf are actually trying to malign Pakistan Army.
"I want to tell those elements, you are using Musharraf as an excuse to target someone else. And you don't have the courage to name that someone else. Let me name them. That someone else is Pakistan Army and you are targeting our army on the behest of anti-sate elements as part of your heinous agenda to weaken Pakistan."
Speaking at the floor of the house, Mushahid Ullah Khan from Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) slammed the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) led federal government. "This government is living in imaginary world where Riasat-e-Medina (welfare state of Medina) is being created and people are living an ideal life. But in reality, people are immensely suffering due to sheer incompetence of this government."
He said the government's claims to improve the economic conditions of the country are false. "The truth is that the PML-N government had brought stability in economy.
This government went into reversal mode and plunged the economic condition from stable to negative and now they are able to bring it back to stable. Their claims to improve the economy are far from reality. Had there been any improvement in economy, the people would not have been suffering. Parents don't have money to pay schools' fees of their children and this government claims everything is okay, it is not so."
Human Rights Minister Dr Shireen Mazari said that the Senate may discuss the annual report of the National Commission on the Status of Women for the year 2017. The house would take up discussion on the report in its session scheduled today (Friday) at 3:30 pm.