Why Parliamentary system in Pakistan?

 Dear Readers,

Back in 1973, Pakistan constituted a new constitution which gave us a parliamentary form of government system. As far as I understand, the salient feature of a parliamentary system is that from every part of the country people would elect their representative who will then represent them in the parliament to make laws for the overall betterment of the society. 

Now the question arises, whether this feature was ever followed in Pakistan… the answer is NO. Here we chose to have political parties and whatever their leader suggests they have to abide by the same. This serves nothing to overall concept of democracy because if one person is deciding or I should say influencing the opinions of hundreds of members of the parliament then in now way we can call it democracy and eventually it translates into autocracy. 

On the other hand MNA was never supposed to do development in his own constituency but yet every candidate of MNA asks for vote in exchange of development in the constituency. This negates the concept of aforementioned system prevailing in Pakistan. 

Now i would like to put some light on the people of Pakistan who have been deprived of education and nutrition throughout these years and they were supposed to get educated through the so called 4th pillar of Pakistan i.e. Media but there has been no discussion whatsoever on this subject. People must be told “WHAT DO THEY VOTE FOR” and “FOR WHAT SHOULD THEY VOTE FOR”. 

Moreover, most of the people vote for the leader of the party and this is an accepted fact amongst the members of the party as well then why Parliamentary system? Recently many members of PML-N said that party decided to vote for extension and thus we voted which proves that members of the parliament dont have a say of their own. They cannot hold an opinion which they think is right so again this goes against the current system of Parliament. 

Another established phenomena is ‘ELECTABLES’. We all know their purpose for which they contest in elections. Then why Parliamentary system? Either there should be no party system as in 1985 OR nobody should be allowed to contest independently. I must mention here that Independents take around 6 million votes in every election and later they become the decisive factor in formation of the new government. 

The dilemma which we are facing is that when we talk about no party system, it is directly linked to Zia ul Haq and whenever we talk about Presidential form of government, it is directly linked to Ayub Khan. Why? Are these systems non existent in the world… answer is NO. They do exist and many countries are successful with them. 

In the end I would just reiterate that Yes we are bound by the constitution but it can be changed according to how beneficial it is for the people of Pakistan and if it complies with current dynamics or not. Its time that we change our mindsets and think beyond by saying:

“We are bound by whichever constitution of the country is beneficial for the prosperity of Pakistan and its people”

Sheeraz Kazi

Youtube https://youtube.com/channel/UCCUP2UgnGSfBo9sRkbjE2Aw

Twitter:

@SheerazKazi