LAHORE: All eyes are on today’s parallel budget sessions as both Governor Baligh ur-Rehman and Speaker Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, who represent two sides of the political divide, are showing no signs of softening their stance, and have convened the sessions at Punjab Assembly and Aiwan-i-Iqbal, respectively.
While the speaker has called the session at 1:00 pm, the governor has summoned the session at 3:00 pm.
Minister Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari will deliver the budget speech at Aiwan-e-Iqbal.
Following the situation created in the Punjab Assembly after a strong stance taken by Speaker Elahi and the opposition party — the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), the governor prorogued the 40th session on Tuesday night.
Earlier, at the start of the session, which started eight hours and 43 minutes behind the scheduled time at 1:00 pm, the speaker gave the mike to Leghari but he refused to address and said the governor had prorogued the session so it was illegal and unconstitutional to hold the session now.
Members of the treasury benches, belonging to the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) left the chamber. Later, the speaker adjourned the session until today.
It is pertinent to mention here that the budget session also faced a delay on the second day as Elahi insisted on apologies from the chief secretary and provincial police chief for conducting raids and making cases against the PTI leaders and workers.
The government, on the other hand, refused to accept his condition so a deadlock between the government and the speaker is still continuing.
A meeting of the opposition’s parliamentary party has been called in the assembly’s meeting room.
Meanwhile, the leader of the opposition in the Punjab Assembly, Sibtain Khan, visited Elahi to hold consultations on the session.
Sources said Elahi has directed the assembly secretary and lawmakers against attending the Aiwan-e-Iqbal session.
On the other hand, Punjab Chief Minister Hamza Shahbaz has summoned a meeting which will be attended by the cabinet members. The meeting will discuss how to hold the session at Aiwan-e-Iqbal without the assembly staff as there is ambiguity over who will write down the assembly meeting’s minutes and how the motions will be presented.
