Fata reforms bill held back due to technicalities: Amir Muqam

KARACHI: The decision to hold back the Fata reforms bill was taken due to some technicalities and the legislation will be presented again “soon” after ractification of the issues, ruling party leader Amir Muqam claimed on Tuesday.

The president of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chapter was talking to the media at the residence of his party’s Sindh General Secretary, Shah Mehmood Shah, after he arrived in the city on a political visit.

An uproar in the National Assembly was witnessed on Monday as the government put the legislation off the agenda at the eleventh hour. Opposition parties and lawmakers from the Fata, led by the Pakistan People's Party leader and opposition leader in the house, staged a walkout in protest from the legislative hall.

The Supreme Court and High Court (Extension of Jurisdiction to Fata) Bill 2017 seeks an expansion of the writ of the state in the tribal areas in the northwestern areas of the country.

Muqam opined that PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif was himself a staunch proponent of reforms in Fata and there were no ulterior motives behind removing the presentation of the bill from the agenda. “Soon, it will be tabled in the house,” he said.

Taking a jibe at the opposition parties, particulary the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, he said that the champions of democracy were putting hurdles in the way of a democratic government.

He said that his party wanted to see holding of the general election on time, without any delay; however, the pressure groups were themselves wary of going into the people’s court i.e. election.

The self-claimed agents of change had shut the accountability in KP, the province they have a government in, he said, criticizing Imran Khan’s PTI which is at the front of an accountability campaign launched against the Sharif and his family and led to his ouster.

Talking about the Karachi politics, he said the MQM groups' saga had confused politicians too as they were finding it hard to decide who to talk to.