Pakistan's Parliament backs emergency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as PTI goes to court

Pakistan’s National Assembly and Senate on Wednesday endorsed the emergency that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s government imposed on Khyber Pakhtunkhwa three days earlier. Hours later, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) took the fight to the Peshawar High Court, asking judges to throw out the proclamation and put its sidelined chief minister, Sohail Afridi, back in office.

The resolutions approve the proclamation issued by President Asif Ali Zardari on 11 October under Article 232 of the Constitution. Question Hour was suspended for the debate, and the vote in the National Assembly was carried by majority. The Senate followed soon after.

A calmer House

The session lacked the usual uproar. Shehbaz attended part of it and shook hands with Opposition Leader Mehmood Khan Achakzai, and Speaker Ayaz Sadiq praised both sides for “attempting more than their capacity so that the matter is settled”.

Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar said the situation in the province was “turning into a threat to national security to an alarming extent”. Earlier in the day he said the emergency covers the whole province, not only the 12 districts hit hardest by militancy, which will get a separate Area Development Secretariat.

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif told the PTI it did not have clean hands and accused Afridi of taking directions from Afghanistan. Farooq Sattar of the MQM-P called the decision extremely difficult but unavoidable and urged the PTI: “Openly condemn terrorism.”

Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, whose PPP supports the government, called the PTI’s conduct a “political suicide attack” on its own provincial government. He also warned that an emergency was “always a stopgap measure”. “We cannot sustain the emergency forever,” he said, urging both sides to talk. PTI chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan said his party rejected the move but welcomed the call for dialogue.

Achakzai went further, saying governor’s rule could be imposed on Sindh next. “Have some sense. Negotiate,” he told the government, offering to help resolve the dispute over access to jailed PTI founder Imran Khan.

The case in Peshawar

Gohar’s petition, drafted by a panel that includes Salman Akram Raja and Sameer Khosa, argues that the proclamation is “tainted with malice in law and fact” and lacks objective material. It says removing the chief minister and his ministers breaches several constitutional articles, and that the army could not be deployed without a request from the provincial government.

The PTI wants Afridi and his cabinet restored, the detained legislators released, Afridi produced in court and the governor’s report to Islamabad made public. No hearing date had been set by Wednesday night.

Afridi’s legal troubles are growing. Prosecutors on Tuesday added him and four other PTI figures to the case over the May 2023 attack on the Radio Pakistan building in Peshawar, citing forensic facial matches from video clips. PTI leaders dispute the videos. The anti-terrorism court will next hear the case on 28 October.

On Wednesday night Sadiq issued production orders for two PTI members held by Punjab police, Sanaullah Khan Masti Khel and Dawar Khan Kundi, so they can attend sittings. The party had sought orders for nine.

What comes next

The National Assembly meets again at 11 am on Friday. Governor’s rule, under Article 234, must still go before a joint sitting of Parliament. It lapses after two months unless approved there and cannot run beyond six months in all.