A two-member bench of the Islamabad High Court has held that advisers and special assistants cannot head cabinet committees or act as ministers, in the absence of a minister who had been elected and put in that place as a result of votes cast by the people. The court has held that the constitution mandates that only elected persons will be in a position to run government and take decisions and as such head ministries…
Posts published in “Pak Media comment”
A recent Islamabad High Court (IHC) ruling has made it illegal for special assistants and advisers to the prime minister to participate in cabinet proceedings. The ruling establishes that while both ‘special’ categories are lawfully entitled to minister-level perks and privileges, they are not, legally speaking, formal members of the cabinet and have no executive authority. Although they can attend cabinet committee meetings “on special requests”, they are not entitled to chair or even be…
by Khurram Husain in Dawn, Dec 10th, 2020The writer is a member of staff.PRECISELY at a time when the government needs a fully functioning finance chief — whether adviser or minister — it seems the scope of the powers being exercised by Hafeez Shaikh is being chipped away. Coming at a time when the fiscal pressures on the government are growing, talks with the IMF are reaching a crucial stage and the hunger for more…
Report in Dawn, 09 Dec 2020CHITRAL: The Chitral Development Movement (CDM) has warned of impending food shortages in the twin valleys of Torkhow and Terich if a makeshift bridge is not erected in the Istaru village where flash floods had washed away a suspension bridge in March. Addressing a press conference here on Tuesday, the movement’s chairman Waqas Ahmed Advocate said the two valleys had been completely disconnected from rest of the district a month…
by Tahir Niaz in The Nation, Dec 9, 2020ISLAMABAD – The Tuesday’s meeting of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) was expected to take big decisions. Though it remained short of the timeline about what the opposition parties will be exactly doing on the political front in the coming days, yet it announced that all the opposition lawmakers will submit their resignations to their respective party heads by December 31. PDM head Maulana Fazlur Rehman announced…
Though no structured data is available, according to Prime Minister Imran Khan there are seven million drug addicts in the country. This is a huge number but given the prevalence of drug addicts in neighborhoods streets across the country, and frequent media reports about the deaths of youths because of an overdose of drugs, one can safely guess the number runs in millions and even it could be around more than seven million. Announcing his…
TO do away with the menace of extrajudicial killings carried out by law-enforcement officials in the country, it is essential that the institutions concerned — the police hierarchy itself, the courts and the administration — send out a clear message that there will be consequences for this crime. In this regard, while hearing an appeal on Monday, a Sindh High Court bench ordered the registration of a case against five policemen for the murder of…
by Syed Akhtar Ali Shah in The Express Tribune, December 9th, 2020.The writer is a practising lawyer. He holds PHD in Political Science and heads a think-tank ‘Good Governance Forum’.The print, electronic and social media are engaged in an emotive discussion, pro and contra, over the formation and motives of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), an alliance of parties representing different shades of political ideologies. Proponents of the PDM argue that the alliance has been…
by Zahid Hussain in Dawn, 09 Dec 2020The writer is an author and journalist.WHILE the deadly pandemic devours more lives and the number of infectious cases surges, the ongoing political power game is becoming more vicious. The callousness of our political leadership on both sides of the divide towards this national health crisis could not be more appalling. It seems that people’s lives don’t matter when it comes to political one-upmanship in this countryA desperate…
According to the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), December 13 marks the day when a decisive verdict will be given on the matter of National Assembly (NA) resignations. If the assertions of the leaders are anything to go by, either the probability of resignations will be high or other evidence will have to be presented to back up the bold claims made through time. Until then, in light of PPP’s non-committal response on the question of…
PDM’s resignation problem: Editorial in Daily Times, December 10th, 2020
There should be sincere efforts from all quarters concerned to bring the opposition and the governments to a dialogue table before things reach the point of no return. So far, the opposition is the part of parliament while the government is busy in its usual affairs. After the Pakistan Democratic Alliance (PDM) came up with a vague stance on resignation from assemblies, Prime Minister Imran Khan has shown his unshaken resolve that if the opposition…