En masse resignations: PTI likely to return to National Assembly

PESHAWAR: Despite announcement on the floor of the House, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) is not serious about tendering resignations from the National Assembly and the party leadership is considering returning to the lower house of the parliament.

On April 11, a meeting of the PTI parliamentary party chaired by Chairman Imran Khan had decided to resign from the National Assembly.

Shah Mahmood Qureshi, PTI candidate for the office of the prime minister, had announced minutes before the election for leader of the house that his party lawmakers would resign en masse.

He had walked out of the assembly along with other party members before the House could hold voting to elect the new prime minister.

Former deputy speaker Qasim Suri had also announced accepting the mass resignations of all PTI members. However, the resignations presented in the National Assembly secretariat were not handwritten as required under the rules but were printed and almost all the resignations of about 131 PTI Member National Assembly (MNAs) were in the same printed format.

Interestingly, the resignations were not signed by the respective members but majority of them were signed by their colleagues to fulfil the requirement, reliable sources told The News.

Knowing the fact that resignation of a lawmaker should be handwritten and signed by the member himself, who was also required to verify it before the speaker, showed the seriousness of PTI leadership.

Now that Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf has issued notices to the PTI members to appear before him for verification of their resignations, the PTI is considering returning to the House.

Majority of the PTI MNAs are believed to be reluctant to tender resignations as they have realized that the coalition government was going to hold by-election after accepting their resignations. And this would give the government the opportunity to get a simple majority in the House by winning the vacated seats.

In 2014, the then speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq not only accepted their resignations but also allowed them to draw full salaries without attending the assembly sessions.

However, Raja Pervez Ashraf has not only issued them notices for verification but allowed the payment of salaries for only 11 days instead of receiving full salary for the month of April, the sources said.

Government circles are even considering accepting the resignation of the members who had announced it on the floor of the House, including former prime minister Imran Khan, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Fawad Chaudhry and Shireen Mazari.

Shah Mahmood Qureshi and Fawad Chaudhry have expressed reservations over it, saying it would be injustice if partial resignations were accepted. They have hinted at moving the court if partial resignations were accepted.

There are reports that the PTI’s core committee has discussed the return of members to the National Assembly, but the decision has yet to be taken.