ISLAMABAD: Chairman Senate Mian Raza Rabbani Tuesday said there was no room for martial law in Pakistan and any attempt for such an adventurism would be resisted.
Rabbani’s statement came after the Awami National Party (ANP) Senator Shahi Syed accused both the government and opposition of being hand in glove with anti-democracy forces to pave way for another martial law.
He cautioned the way the delimitation bill was being delayed after passage by the National Assembly showed that the government wanted martial law in the country, as it was convinced that if there was no Nawaz Sharif, then there was no need of democracy.
“The opposition will be equally blamed if the current democratic setup derails,” he said.
Chairing the Senate session, Rabbani said efforts were underway for passage of the proposed legislation relating to delimitation.
He said the issue was taken up by the House Business Advisory Committee on Monday showing that efforts were on to pass the bill.
Leader of the House Raja Zafarul Haq said he had also spoken to the prime minister about the bill and he would also speak to the Sindh leadership before leaving for Turkey.
Minister for Power Awais Leghari admitted that Pakistan had a track record of losing arbitration in the international courts due to which the country owed Rs14 billion to the independent power producers (IPPs).
Winding up debate on an adjournment motion moved by the PPP Senator Sherry about the interim award issued by the London Court of International Arbitration on June 08, 2017 in favour of nine IPPs directing Pakistan to immediately pay Rs10.977 billion, Leghari said Rs10 billion and Rs4 billion fines were to be paid to the IPPs.
He said the government had to bear a huge loss due to arbitration, as contracts were signed without open tender and bidding, as mega projects were doled out without following the laid-down rules, bringing losses of billions of rupees to the national kitty.
However, the minister claimed that Pakistan was on a strong footing as far as the arbitration of Turkish firm Karkey Karadeniz was concerned and the government will vigorously contest the case.
He said the government had achieved a milestone by ending loadshedding adding that it was again the government that brought cheapest LNG to the country.
The minister said the Cabinet Committee on Energy had decided to introduce suitable amendments to the existing policy framework to address various issues relating to power tariff, which will be passed after senators give their proposals.
Leghari said there was mechanism in the past to enhance power generation and now a policy was being framed under which the provinces will be allowed to produce power through wind, solar, small hydel and bio-mass and could also sell it out through competitive bidding.
“A national electricity plan is being prepared and then every year power will be added to the grid which never happened in the past due to which the country is facing power crisis today,” he added.
Later, during discussion on an admitted motion moved by the PPP’s Sherry Rehman, legislators from the treasury and opposition benches demanded that agreements with other nations be placed in Parliament for deliberation and ratification.
The motion is about the interim award issued by the London Court of Arbitration on June 8 this year in favour of nine IPPs directing Pakistan to immediately pay Rs10.977 billion to further discuss the need of parliamentary oversight in key international arbitration.
Those, who took part in the discussion included Sherry Rehman, Tahir Hussain Mashhadi of MQM, Shibli Faraz and Nauman Wazir Khattak of PTI, Usman Kakar of PkMAP, PPP’s Taj Haider and Javed Abbasi of PML-N.
“It is disturbing and shocking that Pakistan is directed to pay around Rs14 billion by the London Court of International Arbitration to IPPs, including outstanding bills and interest payments.
It is also crucial to point out that overdue payments of independent power producers (IPPs) have increased to a whopping Rs205 billion. Where is the government,” asked Senator Sherry.
She pointed out that earlier this year, former minister for water and power Khawaja Asif had acknowledged that the government owed Rs161 billion to the IPPs of which Rs69 billion was under litigation.
“These fines are paid by the tax payers’ money due to government’s negligence. What is more shocking is that the government tried to brush this international arbitration case under the carpet,” she said.
“Absence of parliamentary oversight, especially in key international arbitration cases, is a major reason why Pakistan has been losing several important international cases,” she claimed.
Other senators alleged that it was a question of omission and commission and that’s why respective governments had been shying away from Parliament with regard to the agreements’ ratification. They called for parliamentary oversight to ensure transparency in the whole process.
They demanded probe into the three Chinese companies to invest in projects under CPEC and feared they might also seek arbitration. The senators proposed that instead of paying from the national exchequer, penalties must be recovered from those responsible for the mess.
The House was informed that success ratio of arbitration cases involving India was 60 per cent, whereas in Pakistan’s case it was 2 per cent because of non-seriousness and improper preparation to represent Pakistan at the world arbitration forums.
It was also alleged that lawyers would also at times receive bribes not to properly fight the cases. They contended that the loss of Reko Dik case in the world court was also due to corruption and lack of interest.
Rabbani and the senators were surprised when Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sh. Aftab Ahmad sought to move a motion for suspension of the question hour. When the chair asked him for the reason, he informed the House that due to strike of the employees of state-owned Printing Press of Pakistan questions and their answers could not be printed.
To this, Rabbani deplored the fact that how could the Senate as well as the National Assembly be ‘handicapped’ just because of the strike and that too because the employees had not been paid their salaries for over two months as told by the minister.
The chair asked the minister to expedite approval of the summary by evening for release of funds to pay salaries to the employees.
