Islamabad:
The PTI decision to disengage from the parliamentary process expanded to the Senate this week as the party supported senators began to resign from standing committees in accordance with directives issued by the party’s founder Imran Khan.
Following the departure of several PTI legislators from the National Assembly Committee last week, Senator Mirza Muhammad Afridi confirmed his resignation from five central senate’s standing committees, including trade, industries and production, education, energy and inter-province coordination.
When he talked about the decision, Senator Afridi said he stepped down on the instructions of the party’s founder. “I give up my committee membership in accordance with the directive issued by the party’s founder,” he said in a short statement.
He, together with senior PTI leader and former federal minister Senator Azam Khan Swati, became also retired from five senate committee – cabinet, financial affairs, health, law and justice and rules and procedure.
In a heavily formulated statement, Swati described the speed as a protest against the existing parliamentary system. “These resignation are intended to detect our resistance to a system that has lost its ability to maintain constitutional order and the rule of law,” he said.
Swati added that he had submitted his resignation to PTI’s parliamentary leader in the Senate, Senator Ali Zafar, who would forward them to Senate President.
Departure follows a clear directive issued by PTI founder Imran Khan only one day earlier, and instructs all PTI associated senators to resign from their respective committee roles.
The move is largely seen as part of the party’s broader political strategy to signal its rejection of what it claims is a manipulated and uneven parliamentary setup.
The Senate’s resignation comes on the heels of a similar emigration in the National Assembly, where the party began its withdrawal from committee last month.
The first big resignation came from Junaid Akbar, who stepped down as chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). His departure was soon followed by a wave of resignation submitted by PTI legislators, where President Gook Ali Khan formally handed over 18 resignation to the National Assembly’s speaker office.
PTI Secretary Information Sheikh Waqas Akram also withdrew from PAC and the Standing Committee for Information and reinforces the party’s position that it would no longer participate in parliamentary business.
