Pakistan Tehreek-e-insaf (PTI) has officially resigned from all the permanent committees of the Senate, intensifying its political disengagement from the parliamentary process to protest against what it describes as an “ engineering system ”.
The PTI parliamentary leader in the Senate, lawyer Ali Zafar, submitted the resignations of the party’s senators on Tuesday to the Senate Sectariat.
Speaking outside the Parliament, he said that this decision was part of a unanimous decision of the party. “We have decided to withdraw from all the committees of the Senate. Today, I submitted the resignation of our senators in accordance with our collective decision,” he said.
Learn more: PTI senators are starting to resign permanent committees
The decision follows a previous directive of the founder of PTI, Imran Khan, which would have asked the legislators supported by the parties to leave the committee posts in the two chambers of Parliament. Last week, PTI senators began to resign individually from their committee assignments.
Senator Mirza Muhammad Afridi left five eminent committees – trade, industries and production, education, energy and interpreting coordination. Senator Azam Swati followed suit and resigned from the committees of the cabinet, economic affairs, health, law and justice, as well as rules and procedures.
The party had already started to leave the committees of the National Assembly last month, citing similar concerns.
