ISLAMABAD: In a significant move, the government on Friday quietly introduced a crucial bill in the National Assembly, seeking to grant military and civil armed forces the authority to keep individuals facing terrorism charges in ‘preventive’ detention for up to three months. Deputy Speaker Syed Ghulam Mustafa Shah referred the bill, which proposes amendments to the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) 1997, …
ISLAMABAD: The government has decided to defer the introduction of a key bill — seeking to amend the Supreme Court Practice and Procedure Act — in parliament due to a lack of consensus among the coalition partners, sources told Dawn. During the National Assembly’s sitting on Monday, a couple of treasury lawmakers had hinted that the government planned to table …
KARACHI: National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq has said that he would not act on the Supreme Court’s decision in the matter of the reserved seats allocated to PTI, saying that he would prefer to wait for the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) decision before taking action. In a wide-ranging interview with Geo News aired on Sunday, he referred to the …
ISLAMABAD: National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq on Tuesday ordered an inquiry into the allegations levelled by Opposition Leader Omar Ayub Khan about the presence of the “personnel of the intelligence agencies in the uniform of assembly’s security officials” inside the house during the proceedings related to the 26th Constitutional Amendment bill aimed at bringing drastic changes to the judicial system. …
ISLAMABAD: Weeks after an embarrassing retreat on a package seeking sweeping changes to the Constitution, the government plans to bring it to parliament soon, hoping that it will secure the required support for its passage. “The constitutional package is most likely to land in parliament in the first week of October,” Irfan Siddiqui, PML-N’s parliamentary leader in the Senate, told …
ISLAMABAD: Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the chief of his own faction of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-F), has said he rejected the government’s proposed constitutional amendments, criticising the draft for limiting fundamental rights and expanding the military’s role. The JUI-F leader made the statement while speaking to the media in Multan on Friday, highlighting his concerns over the draft received from the government. …
ISLAMABAD: Following a flurry of meetings in Islamabad on a Sunday, centred around the residence of JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the National Assembly and Senate sessions are set to convene at some point tonight over the highly anticipated but closely guarded ‘constitutional package’. Both the sessions were scheduled for much earlier in the day but have been delayed multiple …
ISLAMABAD: Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Senator Ishaq Dar, and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari have held a meeting to discuss the current political situation and the proposed constitutional amendments. The meeting took place in Bilawal’s chamber at the Parliament House, where Law Minister Senator Azam Nazeer Tarar also joined the discussions. Sources revealed that Dar and …
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Saturday took all allied parties into confidence over the proposed constitutional package on the judiciary, which includes a bill to fix the tenure of the Chief Justice of Pakistan at three years. It is expected to be introduced in parliament today (Sunday). A source, who attended the meeting, told it was decided that the …
ISLAMABAD: The raid by plainclothesmen inside the National Assembly to arrest PTI members united the government and opposition lawmakers in the upper house on Thursday as they sought action against those responsible for disrespecting the House. In a resolution that was approved with bipartisan support, lawmakers called for changing the rules to “protect the dignity of parliament” and demanded punishment …