Pak govt delegation meets Maulana Fazlur Rehman to seek support on constitutional amendment bill

Islamabad, Sep 15 (PTI) A delegation of the Pakistan government Sunday met with leading cleric and right-wing politician Maulana Fazlur Rehman to seek his support for a controversial constitutional amendment bill, aimed at changing the laws related to the judiciary.
    The details of the amendments are still a mystery as the government has not officially shared it with the media or discussed it publically. What has been reported so far shows that the government plans to increase the retirement age of judges and fix the tenure of the chief justice of the Supreme Court.
    Currently, Article 179 of the Constitution envisages that a judge of the Supreme Court shall hold office until he attains the age of 65 years, whereas Article 195 of the Constitution says that a judge of a high court shall hold office until he attains the age of 62 years. It has also been proposed that the retirement age of superior judges should be increased by three years.
    Furthermore, the government is also mulling revising the seniority principle in the appointment of the top judge. At present, according to Article 175A of the Constitution, only the senior-most judge of the Supreme Court is appointed as the Chief Justice.
    The government, through the constitutional amendment, also wants to form a constitutional court and amend Article 63-A of the Constitution — which deals with the defection of the lawmakers.
    The government lacks a two-thirds majority to amend the constitution and needs the support of Maulana Rehman whose Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl (JUI-F) with eight members of the National Assembly and five Senators is in a unique position to play a decisive role in the parliament.
    He was the focus of attention for the entire day as delegations of the government and opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) kept on visiting him during the day.
The government delegation included Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar, Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi, and Azam Nazeer Tarar.
    Sources said that the Maulana in principle supports the amendments but not the entire package. He also wants that the PTI should also be taken on board to create consensus on the constitutional package of changes.
    The National Assembly and Senate sessions were convened separately on Sunday, an unusual development as it only happens in budget sessions or sittings convened for a specific, time-sensitive issue.
    The NA session was initially slated for 11:30 am but then changed to 4 pm. Later the session was delayed until 8 pm. Similarly, the Senate session slated for 4 pm was rescheduled to 7 pm, but it was again changed until 11 pm.
    Similarly, the cabinet was scheduled to meet to endorse the amendment before placing it before the parliament. But the meeting was delayed.
    Information Minister Atta Tarar in the evening told the media that the tabling of the constitutional amendment has been delayed as consultations have been going on to create consensus. "The process of consultation will continue until an agreement is reached,” he said.
    He said that the changes in the constitution are part of the reforms to facilitate the masses and it was not person specific, adding that the changes will positively impact everyone in the country.
    Tarar said that the government was trying to introduce the amendment today.
    Earlier, the package was expected to be tabled in the parliament on Saturday but was put on hold by the ruling coalition, apparently due to lack of required numbers. However, no explanation for the delay in the introduction of the set of constitutional amendments was offered by the government.

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)