PTI decides to boycott NA sessions, hold protests outside Parliament House

• Decision taken in accordance with Imran Khan’s directives: Gohar
• He says party will hold peaceful protest outside Parliament House.
• Waqas Akram says MNAs will briefly attend, then boycott sessions.

ISLAMABAD: After submitting resignations from multiple parliamentary panels, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has now decided to boycott National Assembly (NA) sessions, The News reported on Tuesday.

The move, in line with the PTI founder Imran Khan’s directives, will see the party converge outside the Parliament House for informal proceedings.

The development comes against the backdrop of multiple disqualifications of PTI lawmakers, including former leader of the opposition in the NA and Senate Omar Ayub and Shibli Faraz, after the courts sentenced them in cases related to the May 9 riots — further exacerbating the former ruling party’s existing legal woes.

Announcing the decision, PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan said that the parliamentary party’s members fully support the decision and they would now be staging peaceful protest gatherings outside the Parliament House.

“Our members were disqualified, and we were not even allowed to speak. If we wanted to celebrate Independence Day, they did not allow us to do so either,” Gohar lamented while reflecting on PTI lawmakers’ disqualifications.

“We tried to present our demands in the assembly session in a democratic manner, but we were not allowed to speak,” the PTI chairman added.

When contacted, PTI Information Secretary Waqas Akram confirmed the development. But when asked, would the party lawmakers totally stay away from the session, he explained that the members would briefly attend each sitting and then come out in protest.

“Our members will hold assembly outside the Parliament,” he explained.

Meanwhile, NA Speaker Ayaz Sadiq has urged PTI-backed Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) members to reconsider their decision to resign from the standing committees of the Lower House.

“I wish that they should remain part of the standing committees of the House,” Sadiq said while while chairing a meeting of the House Business Advisory Committee a day earlier.