By Asghar Ali Mubarak
ISLAMABAD: The government and opposition have reached an agreement on the nomination of Senate members to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
The PAC will include three members from the opposition and three from the government.
On April 24, the government and the opposition in the National Assembly finalised their negotiations for a power-sharing formula and agreed to the framework for the composition of the standing committees of the lower house of parliament.
Two members will be from the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), and one will be from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
From the opposition, Senators Shibli Faraz, Aon Abbas Buppi, and Mohsin Aziz have been nominated as members of the PAC.
From the government side, Senators Saleem Mandviwalla, Sherry Rehman, and Afnanullah will represent the committee.
Following this agreement, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar will present the six names for approval at the Senate session scheduled for tomorrow.
Once the Senate approves the nominations, the activation of the PAC will accelerate.
It is worth noting that the government is required to complete the formation of all standing committees, including the PAC, within 30 days. However, despite five months having passed, the government has yet to finalize the PAC’s establishment.
The formation of the standing committees would complete the government formation process.
According to documents available with The Express Tribune, both sides agreed to allocate the chairmanship of 26 committees to the treasury and 11 to the opposition.
As per the agreed formula, the all-powerful Public Accounts Committee (PAC) would be led by an opposition lawmaker, while the Kashmir committee would be led by a treasury member. The National Assembly speaker would himself chair the House Business Advisory Committee.
The PAC would comprise 23 members—16 from the treasury benches and seven from the opposition. Its chairman would be an opposition lawmaker, for which the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had named Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) head Sahibzada Hamid Raza.
Previously, it was reported that the PTI founder had named Sher Afzal Marwat for the post, but, according to the sources, he withdrew his decision and now instructed National Assembly opposition leader Omar Ayub Khan to nominate Raza for the PAC chairmanship.
