Caretaker PM: Govt, opposition keeping cards close to their chest

ISLAMABAD: Never ever has such tight, inimitable secrecy been maintained over the prospective caretaker prime minister as it has been kept this time with the ostensible objective of avoiding a nominee from public controversy and battering.

Same is the case with the next interim chief ministers. All sides are exercising care and caution for their own reasons. With just 25 days of the present government left in office, the interim premier is still a brainteaser as no names have been tossed around by the main constitutional consultees – Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah.

The opposition leader has remarked that he is not divulging the names to keep them away from public dissection and scrutiny, fueling unnecessary rows. Since the two sides have kept their cards close to their chest, there is no positive or negative speculation in political circles. Khursheed Shah has now stated that a consensus nominee, who will be a man of character, will be selected by May 15.

Abbasi has thrown the ball in Khursheed Shah’s court stating that he will accept the name recommended by him. In this scenario, the responsibility has come on the opposition leader’s shoulders. Because of this obligation, Khursheed Shah is apparently quite guarded with the seeming aim of coming up to the premier’s expectation.

At the time of selection of the federal and provincial interim governments and high position holders like the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) chairmen in the past, there had always been intense rows and scrambles between the two principal consultees. They had been making their recommended names public. It is now a different ball-game altogether.

The prime minister and his Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) have cited no preference at all. So has done Khursheed Shah. However, there have been reports that the names of former chief justices Tassaduq Hussain Jilani and Nasirul Mulk, and Dr Ishrat Hussain, among some others, have been considered at certain levels.

Obviously, Abbasi has not proposed any name on the direction of PML-N supreme leader and ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif. It is quite possible that by supporting the nominee recommended by Khursheed Shah, the PML-N is keen to send a message to estranged Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) supremo and former president Asif Ali Zardari that all is not lost between them because of the tension prevailing for quite some time and there is still room for rapprochement on critical issues.

The PML-N expects that the opposition leader will suggest at least three names, giving a chance to it to go for one of them. While choosing the NAB chairman, it had also favoured PPP’s favourite Justice (R) Javed Iqbal. However, since his appointment noose has been unprecedentedly tightened around the neck of several PML-N leaders at this crucial time of the election campaign for the fast approaching parliamentary polls.

According to the constitutional scheme, any figure who won the consensus of the prime minister and the opposition leader will become the interim premier.

If they failed to agree on any name, they will send their two recommendations each to a bipartisan parliamentary committee, to be constituted by Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, having equal representation of the treasury and opposition, proposed by Abbasi and Khursheed Shah. If this forum was also unable to reach an accord on any name, it will forward the four names to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) for selection of one of them. It is the ECP – the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and its four members – and not the CEC alone that will take this final decision that can’t be called into question in any court of law.

The caretaker prime minister and provincial interim chief ministers are to remain in office just for sixty days as required by the Constitution. Under Article 224 of the Constitution, members of the caretaker cabinets including the prime minister and chief ministers and their immediate family members including spouses and children shall not be eligible to contest the immediately following elections.

While there has always been a hard competition to get its preferred names inducted as the interim prime minister or chief ministers, these caretakers have very limited functions to perform. Section 230 of the Elections Act clearly specifies their domain. It says a caretaker government shall perform its functions to attend to day-to-day matters which are necessary to run the affairs of the government; assist the ECP to hold polls in accordance with law; restrict itself to activities that are of routine, non-controversial and urgent, in the public interest and reversible by the future government elected after the elections; and be impartial to every person and political party.

The interim government shall not take major policy decisions except on urgent matters; shall not take any decision or make a policy that may have effect or pre-empt the exercise of authority by the future elected government; shall not enter into major contract or undertaking if it is detrimental to public interest; shall not enter into major international negotiation with any foreign country or international agency or sign or ratify any international binding instrument except in an exceptional case; shall not make promotions or major appointments of public officials but may make acting or short term appointments in public interest; shall not transfer public officials unless it is considered expedient and after approval of the ECP; and shall not attempt to influence the elections or do or cause to be done anything which may, in any manner, influence or adversely affect the free and fair elections.

The caretaker prime minister, chief ministers or a minister or any other members of an interim governments shall, within three days from the date of assumption of office, submit to the ECP a statement of assets and liabilities including assets and liabilities of his spouse and dependent children.