A fresh political crisis has given birth to yet another constitutional controversy over the interpretation of Article 63-A in the light of recent Supreme Court orders. The SC had declared defection a “cancer” in its interpretation of Article 63-A, adding that defection was no small matter as it is the fundamental right of political parties that its members remain loyal to it. CJP Umar Ata Bandial had observed that the loyalty of members was a basic right of political parties. The apex court had said that votes cast against party direction cannot be counted and must be disregarded.
The issue to be decided now is whether it is the party leader or the party’s parliamentary leader who has the authority to issue the party’s guideline. There are some who are interpreting directions of a ‘parliamentary party’ in Article 63A as directions of the ‘leader of the parliamentary party’ as opposed to party head. The SC has refused in the past to uphold a declaration of defection because there was no “specific direction of the party head”
For the common man what is good for the goose should be good for the gander also. If 25 PTI members were de-seated for voting against the party chief’s mandate, justice required that the 10 PML-Q members voting against the directions of PML-Q chief should also be sacked. In political parties of Pakistan, party leaders wield all power. They are the final authority in devising policies, making alliances, issuing tickets to party candidates and appointing parliamentary leaders. If provincial parliamentary leaders were to be given the authority to take policy decisions, there may be a situation in which a party head is giving one policy and the parliamentary party is going against it, as was seen in the CM’s election on Friday. Similarly the same party could be following contradictory policies and alliances in different provinces.
This said there is a whole lot of eminent jurists some declaring Mazari’s ruling illegal while others taking an opposite stand. With Punjab mired in political crisis for months and disagreement over how to overcome it, the way out was a ruling by a full court. Now that the current 3-member bench under CJP Bandial has refused to for a full court bench, or any larger bench, the PDM has boycotted these proceedings, thereby declaring no confidence in the apex court. This does not do any favours to the reputation and credibility of the judiciary nor the prevalent political unrest in the country.
