IT was the darkest night of the country’s parliamentary history. The spectacle of two opposition lawmakers from Balochistan — one on a wheelchair and the other, a female member, wrapped in a dark shawl — being whisked to the Senate session tells the story of how the 26th Amendment to the Constitution was passed. The two had been reported missing for some time. The security guards would not let any journalist speak to them. Their vote helped the ruling coalition clinch the required number in the Upper House.
After the Senate vote, the National Assembly met at midnight. Half a dozen opposition legislators who had also, allegedly, been missing for the past several days appeared on the treasury benches. The defectors completed the number required to pass the amendment in the Lower House too. That’s how the ‘brute majority’, which PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari had threatened to use, delivered.
What happened on the night of Oct 20 and 21 has demolished the very foundation of the Constitution that ensured the trichotomy of power. One by one, leaders of the ruling parties rose to hail their success in taming the judiciary. They declared it a triumph of democracy and the supremacy of parliament. Little do they realise that they are just pawns in the larger game of thrones. It was a Pyrrhic victory that they were celebrating.
It was amusing to watch young Bilawal pontificating on how the amendment that establishes a separate constitutional bench nominated by a judicial commission packed with government nominees fulfils the “Quaid’s vision”. He also cited the pledge made in the Charter of........