Legislation on ice drug in final stage, KP Assembly told

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly was told Friday that legislation on crystal methamphetamine, commonly known as ice, was in the final stage and would be tabled in the House soon.

In reply to a call attention notice by Sardar Aurangzeb Nalotha of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) who drew the attention of the House towards increase in the use of ice drug in the province, especially in Peshawar and Abbottabad, the speaker as well as Law Minister Sultan Muhammad said the bill was in the final stage and would be passed soon from the assembly.

They said that since the drug was newly introduced, legislation was needed to find a control over its use. To another call attention notice by Salahuddin of the Awami National Party (ANP) about the alleged interference in his constituency by the KP governor and a member of National Assembly, Minister for Local Government Shahram Tarakai assured there would be no such interference as nobody was above the law. Everybody including governor or MNA has to remain within his domain, he added.

The minister assured Munawwar Khan of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) that his constituency would not be ignored in the development schemes.

Munawwar Khan had complained that the secretary local government had issued a notification about uplift of urban areas of Lakki Marwat district but it did not mention the rural areas of the district.

He said on the chief minister’s directives Rs700 billion were allocated for uplift schemes in one constituency of the health minister but the other two constituencies of the district were ignored.

But the minister assured that development schemes would be executed where needed without any discrimination.

Earlier, Sardar Hussain Babak of the ANP said the government departments were deceiving the House by giving wrong figures and information to answer questions by the members.

Two bills, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2019 and KP Public Procurement Regularity Authority (Second Amendment) Bill, 2019 were introduced in the House, before the session was adjourned till 10am on Monday.