Barbs fly in NA as ministers, Omar Ayub cross swords

ISLAMABAD: Federal ministers and Opposition Leader Omar Ayub Khan Monday traded barbs in the National Assembly, three days prior to the third round of talks between the negotiating teams.

Agitated by the PTI parliamentarians hooting and sloganeering, Defence Minister Khwaja Asif asked whether talks were possible in such an environment. “They (PTI leaders) say I am against the negotiations; they themselves do not want talks, as their behaviour in the National Assembly can’t help talks succeed,” he said.

Asif said by disrupting the proceedings, the PTI members were disrupting the talks process. “This is not acceptable that they violate the rules, deliver speeches and leave the House after making noise,” he said.

He told Deputy Speaker Ghulam Mustafa Shah, who presided over the proceedings, that the PTI leadership had never been sincere in talks. He said if they (PTI members) did not want to talk to the government, then they should speak to whoever they wanted. “Why they are holding talks particularly when they were saying 15 days back that we have no authority?”he further asked.

He advised the chair against giving leverage to the PTI leaders and being blackmailed by them. Minister for Information and Broadcasting Attaullah Tarar came down hard on the PTI leadership saying through their agents inside and outside the country, they had built a fake narrative on the social media that a massacre took place in Islamabad on November 26 and levelled accusations about the missing workers.

He pointed out that the PTI leaders themselves differed over the number of deaths. Referring to the grandfather of Omar Ayub Khan whom he dubbed hypocrite, Tarar said he (Omar) should be ashamed of pointing a finger at an institution of which he himself was a beneficiary.

“He does not know what he is talking about,” said the minister. Tarar said the PTI leadership should remember the killing of innocent members of a family in Sahiwal during their tenure. “The children of the victims were called at the Chief Minister’s House to express condolences over the killing of their parents,” he said.

He also questioned whether the PTI leadership ever talked about the killing of 25 TLP workers in Lahore and of as many PTI workers in a stampede during the speech of their founder at Qasim Bagh, Multan in their tenure.

“Who is funding the campaign against Pakistan and state institutions through the agents sitting abroad?” he questioned. The minister regretted that the opposition leader left the House after delivering speech saying he lacked courage to listen to the others.

PTI member Iqbal Afridi pointed out lack of quorum during the Tarar’s speech but the House was found in order after the count. Earlier, Omar Ayub reiterated his party’s demand for formation of a judicial commission to probe into the May 09 and November 26 incidents insisting that 13 protestors were gunned down by the snipers and a number of party workers were yet to be found.

He also called for an inquiry commission to probe into what he claimed the mental and physical torture of the PTI workers in military custody. He alleged that the nails of undertrial prisoners had been clipped and torture made many of them mentally unstable and questioned if they were prisoners of war.

He also raised questions over the comments of important government figures on the possible outcome of Al-Qadir Trust case. He said following a deal between the UK’s national crime agency and a private businessman, the money landed in the Supreme Court’s account before being transferred to the national treasury.

He said Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi had nothing to do with the deal. He also demanded a probe into how Hussain Nawaz purchased One Hyde Park property saying the inquiry should start from this case.

“Whether he purchased that property by selling steel?” he asked. The sloganeering and hooting from the PTI parliamentarians prompted Defence Minister Khawaja Asif to take the floor.

Agha Rafiullah of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) also criticised the PTI members’ attitude saying no one should expect that they would raise the common man’s issues. “Their politics revolves round an individual and they want to derail the whole system,” he said, adding that the problem of PTI members concerned a mad person.

Federal Minister Rana Tanveer Hussain also criticised the opposition members for creating uproar in the House, particularly when the question hour was in progress. He said Imran Khan minted money from every project including Shaukat Khanum Hospital, NUML project and Al Qadir Trust.

“First, the land was taken in names of Zulfi Bokhari and Farah Gogi and then transferred to Al Qadir Trust,” he said, adding Imran Khan would receive punishment Insha Allah. JUIF parliamentarian Aliya Kamran said there should be no speeches during the question hour and proper answers to questions of members should be given.