EDITORIAL: The most momentous alteration the 18th Amendment made in the Constitution was abrogation of the President’s power under Article 58(2)(b) that was inserted by the military dictator General Ziaul Haq to dissolve the National Assembly in case he believes “a situation has arisen in which the government of the Federation cannot be carried on in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution and an appeal to the electorate is necessary”.
That done, Pakistan today is a parliamentary democracy in which the President remains the Head of the State, the ‘symbol of the unity of the federation’ and not as the country’s chief executive. In the performance of his constitutional duties he is above the fray and apolitical in his conduct.
And that role is more specifically defined in his oath of office, under which he undertakes that “In all circumstances, I will do right to all manner of people, according to law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will”. Simply stated, President Arif Alvi is expected to be apolitical, accessible to everybody irrespective of his past political affiliation and required to carry out his constitutional obligations unreservedly.
The constitutional role of a provincial Governor is not very different from that of the President. He too is under oath; according to which, “That, in all circumstances, I will do right to all manner of people, according to law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will”.
But that does not seem to be happening now. While President Alvi avoided to administer oath of office to PM-elect Shehbaz Sharif and his cabinet nominees on two consecutive occasions on grounds of ill health, the Governor of Punjab, Umar Sarfraz Cheema, has followed suit by describing the resignation of the outgoing chief minister Usman Buzdar as “illegal” and therefore the election of the new chief minister as a nullity in law. He has refused to administer oath to chief minister-elect Hamza Shehbaz Sharif.
Agreed, the vote of no-confidence against the then prime minister Imran Khan was passed by the National Assembly while his party members had boycotted the proceedings. But that doesn’t in any way nullify the outcome of the vote of no-confidence against him. In a working democracy to be in power is as critical as being out of power.
The opposition in a legislative house is supposed to be the government-in-waiting. It is also considered the second wheel of the golden chariot of democracy. Since these resignations are still not accepted by the Speaker their withdrawal by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf would be the profoundly valuable contribution to the cause of democracy in Pakistan.
On the day of election of Chief Minister of Punjab the atmospherics in the provincial assembly were not very different from those in the National Assembly except for the fact that the ruckus in there was simply unprecedented.
And whatever be the official version of that pandemonium in the house and who caused it, the fact remains that at the end of the day the house elected Hamza Sharif as Chief Minister. Certainly, in today’s Pakistan the behaviour of political players has touched new lows in utter disregard of the Constitution and rule of law.
But this excessive muscle-flexing tends to put the country’s political elite in the category of the Roman gladiators, except for the difference that while they fought for the joy of spectators our political leaders have caused immense pain to the generality whose day-to-day life is hellish and their pain untreatable. This is unacceptable. Our political messiahs should shun the path of confrontation, join hands to strengthen rule of law and thus secure future of democratic system in the country.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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