Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry revealed on Friday that the federal government has decided to file a reference in the Supreme Court – under Article 186 – for interpretation of Article 63 (A) of the Constitution, which is related to the disqualification of an assembly member on grounds of defection.
“Supreme Court will be asked for its opinion on the legal status of the vote when members of a party are explicitly involved in horse-trading and change allegiances in exchange for money,” the information minister said in a series of tweets.
He further said that the SC would be requested to hear the reference on a daily basis and reach a verdict.
The development comes a day after around two dozen disgruntled MNAs of the ruling PTI came out in the open, turning the ongoing power game ugly for Prime Minister Imran Khan even before the voting on the no-confidence motion.
Taking refuge at the Sindh House in the federal capital, several of them gave interviews to different anchorpersons, saying they had parted ways with the ruling party and would not contest the next elections on a PTI ticket.
One of them rubbed even more salt on the wounds when he claimed that three federal ministers had already quit the PTI.
In a startling revelation, PTI’s Ramesh Kumar claimed that 33 members of the assembly, including three federal ministers, had left the ruling party and the prime minister should immediately resign now.
The allegations about coercion and bribery surfaced after PM Imran had claimed during a public address that opposition leaders were sitting in the Sindh House with “heaps of money” to purchase loyalties of treasury lawmakers.
The premier had asked the election commission to take action against this “horse-trading”.
The country plunged into political crisis just a day after PM’s statement when the disgruntled members came out in the open and denied the allegations, saying they were staying at Sindh House over safety concerns and had not received a single penny.
The interviews of the dissenting members and footage running on TV channels showing them present at Sindh House came at a time when the opposition parties, including the ruling party in Sindh, have been attempting to oust the PTI government through a no-trust motion.
Before the situation unfolded, PPP leaders alleged that the government was planning to attack Sindh House on the grounds that the opposition had detained some ruling party lawmakers there ahead of the vote on the no-confidence motion against the prime minister.
Prior to that, PML-Q leader, Speaker Punjab Assembly Parvez Elahi, said in an interview that around 10 to 12 government lawmakers were in “safe custody” of the opposition.
The PML-Q leader said these lawmakers had approached him but were now nowhere to be seen now.
