THE law minister and defence minister had noise-blocking headphones snapped on as they rushed through half a dozen pieces of important legislation on Monday evening. It was a fitting metaphor for the manner in which the ruling parties have lately gone about conducting legislative business. Six bills were introduced in and passed by the National Assembly and Senate in record time to extend the tenure of the armed forces chiefs to five years, with the possibility of another five-year extension, and to increase the number of judges in the Islamabad High Court and Supreme Court. It seems pointless to ask why the government saw it appropriate to bulldoze these bills: for all its stress on ‘supremacy of parliament’, the........

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