On a dull private member’s day in 2022, the Deputy Speaker at that time presided over a three-hour-long National Assembly session, which passed eleven bills into law, many of them of substantial nature, without having the requisite quorum or calling for any debate. It is not hard to believe even those elected members who voted in favour of those bills were aware of the legislation they were enacting, let alone the public.
Yet again, the PDM-led Government passed the controversial ‘Elections Act (Amendment Bill) 2024’ with a majority vote, allegedly designed to frustrate the Supreme Court’s decision on the Reserved Seats matter, despite mass allegations by the members that not even a copy of the proposed amendments was presented for debate, amongst other discrepancies.
The most recent and alarming instance of legislative bulldozing came just last week, when Parliament rushed through the Anti-Terrorism (Amendment) Bill. This critical amendment, passed without debate on its constitutional validity, empowers security agencies to detain individuals for up to six months without access to legal remedies.
This ‘bulldozing’ of legislation is not a new concept; all those who came to power before have participated in the trophy of the legislative process in one way or the other. The PTI government back in 2021, in a single joint sitting, passed a record number of 33 bills, again with the cries of the opposition deafening the hall of the Assembly, calling afoul. The irony is not lost that the perpetrators of today were supposedly the victims of yesterday.
Our Constitution establishes a British-style parliamentary system with two houses: the directly elected National Assembly and the indirectly elected Senate. A bill may originate in either house. Once approved by both houses, it is sent to the President for assent and becomes law.
When the 26th Amendment was passed, which virtually destroyed the concept of any independent judiciary, there was hardly any opposition or deliberation
In theory, the process is detailed in the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the National Assembly, 2007. A Government bill is introduced by the relevant minister, published in The Gazette for public awareness, and referred to the standing committee for scrutiny. The committee is meant to review its constitutionality and recommend changes. Yet this critical step can be bypassed entirely.
Similarly, Rule 123(3) requires at least two days between the circulation of a bill and its tabling for a vote, but even this safeguard is often ignored. The result: legislation can be pushed directly to the floor, leaving members with no time to examine it, raising the question of whether committees exist only as a façade to keep the members occupied.
The quorum of the House is another issue that arises under Article 55 of the Constitution, which states that all decisions of the National Assembly, including the passing of bills, shall be taken by the majority of the members present and voting. It further goes on to state in Sub-Article (2) that the minimum number of members that must be present at a meeting to make proceedings valid is one-quarter of the total members present and voting, which is just 85 members out of a total of 342 members.
This oddly means that only 43 votes of the total membership are required for any bill to become law on any given day. The same goes for the Senate, which requires only a minimum of 24 members from a total of 96 members for a session to become valid, and out of those, only 13 votes are needed for any bill to be passed.
This bulldozing is not a procedural glitch; it is a deliberate dismantling of democracy. It has replaced debate with brute force, public interest with partisan interest, and the rule of law with the rule of the few
The ramifications of the farcical nature of the most important process of our country have been nothing short of devastating, with arbitrary laws being introduced on the whims of the few ruling elites. The legislative process is the cornerstone of democracy and might also be the most important organ of any state: the legislature makes laws, raises revenue, and decides how to spend it. The executive branch derives its powers from the laws they enact.
Even the jurisdiction of the judiciary is decided in those halls, and the purpose of every court in the country is to interpret the laws introduced by the Parliament or any of the provincial assemblies. By far the most important ability it possesses is its power to amend the Constitution, Pakistan’s supreme law. Ours is a constitutional democracy, where the Constitution is supreme. As such, the institution that possesses the power to change the destiny of a nation must take its job with immense seriousness.
Nonetheless, this burden can only be realised when the members possess the capability to comprehend the legislative process and understand the significance of their task, rather than just skipping sessions and voting on bills without question or debate. Dissent, even within one’s own party, is a sign of a healthy democracy and should be promoted religiously rather than being declared as hearsay. The basic job description of a member of Parliament or a provincial assembly is law-making through deliberation and independent voting, not being, for lack of a better word, a rubber stamp for the whims of their party heads.
Dissent and debate are further curtailed through controversial Article 63-A, whereby all-important decisions of the Prime Minister or Chief Minister, a vote of confidence or a vote of no-confidence, a Money Bill or a Constitutional (Amendment) Bill, are hijacked by the party leaders. In simpler terms, the majority of members of the Assemblies do not have any say in the most important aspects of their duty.
It is easy to deduce why this Article found a permanent place in the Constitution: consolidating power to the very few has never been easier. Then, why would any ‘non-essential’ member debate or deliberate in Parliament, when the decision on their vote has already been made behind closed doors by their overlords?
The silence of numerous members was prevalent when they were forced to vote with party policies to facilitate the introduction of Military Courts via the 21st and 23rd Constitutional Amendments. Even when the 26th Amendment was passed, which virtually destroyed the concept of any independent judiciary, there was hardly any opposition or deliberation. These modifications have shaken the very foundation of the Constitution and, once again, without any serious analysis or research, substantially changed the framework of the judiciary in the span of just a decade or so, just on the impulses and wishes of the few to forward their own agenda. They toy with it like children without any thought to the consequences of such volatility to the masses in the future.
This bulldozing is not a procedural glitch; it is a deliberate dismantling of democracy. It has replaced debate with brute force, public interest with partisan interest, and the rule of law with the rule of the few. As this has been allowed to continue for a long time, we are not just left with terrible laws, we have buried the very idea of a democratic Pakistan.