National Assembly (NA) Speaker Ayaz Sadiq again ostensibly made an offer of talks to the opposition, telling a group of parliamentarians visiting him on Friday that dialogue was the way to resolve issues.
He made similar offers to facilitate dialogue between the government and the opposition, the PTI, in the past as well. But, no substantial headway has been made so far, and differences between the two sides largely remain unresolved.
A handout issued by the NA Secretariat said Sadiq met with opposition members of both houses of Parliament in his chamber in Parliament House soon after the adjournment of the NA session due to lack of quorum.
The visiting opposition members included Senator Allama Raja Nasir Abbas, Senator Faisal Javed, former NA speaker Asad Qaiser and PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan. MNAs Iqbal Afridi, Atif Khan, Sardar Latif Khosa and Jamal Ahsan Khan.
“Our bond of brotherhood and mutual respect is greater than politics. I have been in contact with you brothers since 2014. Politics does not last a lifetime – it ends eventually,” said the speaker according to the handout.
Sadiq said the members of Parliament “should have a relationship that lasts throughout life”.
The speaker further stated that he had always advocated for dialogue, stressing that dialogue was the means to resolve issues.
PTI’s Barrister Gohar, during the meeting, raised the issue of PTI founder Imran Khan’s family members not being allowed to meet the incarcerated leader, said the statement.
It added that the opposition members “appreciated” the speaker’s efforts to facilitate dialogue between the two sides.
After more than a year of heightened tensions, the two sides had commenced dialogue in the last week of December last year to bring down political temperatures. But despite weeks of negotiations, the dialogue process stalled on major issues – the formation of two judicial commissions to probe the protests of May 9, 2023 and Nov 26, 2024, and the release of PTI prisoners.
The Shehbaz government had extended a dialogue offer to the opposition PTI in February as NA Speaker Sadiq insisted that the option of talks had never been dropped.
However, a day after the PM made the offer, the PTI refused it.
In early August, the dialogue offer was again extended by government ministers and Speaker Sadiq during a debate on the Kashmir issue in the NA.
The PTI members welcomed the offer for talks but questioned the government’s authority to initiate dialogue.
More recently, Sadiq reiterated his offer on November 13 to facilitate a dialogue between the government and the opposition parties.
The offer was made by the speaker at a time when the opposition members belonging to the PTI were protesting in the assembly during the passage of the 27th Constitutional Amendment Bill.