FROM A RINGSIDE SEAT

The Parliament House has become a traditional location for mass demonstrations like the Hyde Park. Political activists, or any one with a grouse might shelter behind the open space (unlike Hyde Park no restaurant, or entertainment outlets here), with flags, banners, and shout their heart out to attract media attention hoping that their problem might get solved.
No Gallup poll has been conducted about the number of demonstrations or processions that take stand at the open spaces or, how many of the problems are resolved.
Going to the Parliament House this morning we found a group of people from the Sindh office sitting opposite the Supreme Court whose attention they were inviting to end the miseries of those being thrown out of the Sui gas establishment. Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani pleaded their case in the Assembly this afternoon.
We also came upon a group of people huddled in the company of Balochistan MNA Hussain Ahmad sitting on a carpet just in front of the interior main gate, with a number of banners, in protest that the budget had not followed the Constitutional direction of the National Finance Award. They were denied gas in Aighbar, Noshki, Hunsa and Aurak, in Balochistan, as well as a banner to end restriction on the media.
A few hours later the Senate leader of the opposition Raza Rabbani informed Chairman Senate that he and the combined Opposition would proceed outside to join a protest demonstration against the lopsided law and order situation in Karachi and Sindh, following the news of the assassination at Karachi of Basit Aziz, a JTI leader, as well as sundry ills of the city, including electricity black out lasting well over eight hours in the oppressive heat.
Senator Professor Ebrahim Khan and MNA Liaquat Baloch registered similar protests. The latter asked Speaker Chaudhry Amir Husain to call for a report from the Sindh Government. In response, MQM leader Farooq Sattar made a generous response asserting that it was the moral duty of the provincial government to furnish this report.
PPP Information Secretary Sherry Rahman, too, sent a statement to record massive crack down against PPP activist in the Punjab and Sindh. 'All subjects under the sun' may be brought in under the cloak of the general discussion, so say textbooks.
References were also made to eminent personalities such as Ayub Khan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Mohammad Khan Junejo, Nawaz Sharif and Mohtrama Benazir Bhutto, as the lawmakers step by step focused on the affairs of their provinces.
About the debate, people sitting in the press galleries expected striking details of how life of the villagers might have changed during a year.
Though MNA Zulfiqar Dillon made an outstanding clear speech supporting the budget and calling for improvement of human resources, one found very little of constructive suggestions. In fact many of the speeches did not go beyond usual rhetoric, usually a rehash of past speeches.
At times, there were flash back to energy crisis (Fauzia Wahab), which was shutting down the country's industries, suggesting alternative sources including wind turbines and solar energy.
At one time Senator Bangalzi pointed to the absence of post offices (only 133) and medical colleges in his province. Tahira Aslam complained of shortage of medicine in the villages. PPP's Manzur Wassan drew attention to 12 per cent excise duty on gas, and oil which contributed Rs 400 billions to the federal government but passed on only Rs 40 billions to Sindh.
Everyone appreciated the flow of Punjabi poetry from eminent writer Bushra Rahman, but Qari Gul Rahman quoted poetry much more freely. However, a number of women MNAS sounded effective in their statements. Among them was Tehmina Daulatana who showed a bottle of brown water consumed by her constituents to deny availability of clean drinking water.
In this context Mehnaz Rafi brought in the suggestion of gender budgeting for equitable distribution of resources among male and female population. Two interesting proposals came from Senator Haroon and MNA Pervez Malik (brother of former Justice Qayyum Malik, government's advocate in the CJ case).
The former suggested the national budget be introduced in March and a subsequent mid-term review of the budget in December every year, to give more democratic choices to legislators' Qayyum Malik pointed to lack of transparency of Pakistani budgets which concealed 49 per cent of statistics and data from public view.
In this regard we might refer to four significant statements in the Senate. ANP leader Asfandyar Wali made a strong plea for inclusion of elected representatives' full autonomy to the joint jirga with reference to Afghanistan, and that is how peace could return to that troubled land.
At this point Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed declared that although President Musharraf donned a general's uniform he was democratic in attitude and his thoughts, and he should convene a meeting of all parties to thrash out matters about holding fair and free elections.
Senator Ilyas Ahmad Bilour introduced a new benchmark in measuring the $15 billion forex exchange reserves. The reserves had stayed put at $1 billion until 9/11. It increased quickly thereafter because overseas Pakistanis were hurriedly sending money home because of fear of losing the amount, and also because we had joined the coalition against terror.
However, Fata's Shahabuddin made a most fervent plea for restoring justice to the people of the area who were citizens of the state according to Article 1, but still living under the colonial Frontier Crimes Regulation, introduced by alien rulers. He cried that the Fata people must be drawn in the Pakistani mainstream, after the President passed orders under the powers enjoyed by him under Article. 247.
But Minister Sher Afgan Niazi brought in a strange proposal in the Senate asking for framing a code of conduct for parliamentary reporters. The minister accused journalists of distorting the speeches inside the House and picking and choosing sentences from the contents of the speeches. He said that parliamentary decorum necessitated verbatim reproduction of speeches.
More than 30 members speak on an average day, every one speaking for about 30 minutes. It would require a newspaper supplement to carry all that material.
On hearing his submission, Chairman Mohammadmian Soomro appointed a three members committee consisting of Leader of the House Wasim Sajjad, Minister Sher Afgan, and State Information Minister Tareeq Azeem to formulate the Code.
Our minds went back to reports published in September last when the government planned to introduce new regulations to curb television coverage of the parliament proceedings. After the unpleasant incident of June 6 in the National Assembly, the print medium was being drawn in the same net.