LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Q president Chaudhry Shujaat says the army takeovers cannot be checked through amendments in the Constitution.
He said this while talking to the media here on Sunday.
Asked whether the army takeovers could be checked through amendments in the Constitution and laws, he said as a matter of truth “to check the intervention of the army, the institution of the army should be accepted with good intention. They should neither be treated as domestic servants nor humiliated.”
He said when the army wanted to come, it never comes on asking. “One jeep and two trucks are required for this. The trucks keep standing outside (the prime minister’s house) and the (army) general goes inside in jeep, salutes the prime minister and says ‘Sir, we are ready, let’s go.’ And the whole procedure is completed in just 15 to 20 minutes.”
He told a questioner that it was rather strange that the head of the state was being reported as saying if Pervez Musharraf was handed over death sentence and the prime minister wrote him for pardoning the convict he would act upon the prime minister’s advice.
The PML-Q leader asked whether to say this even before the court verdict did not tantamount to contempt of court.
Replying to another question, Shujaat said holding of local body elections was a requirement of the Constitution and not holding the polls also fell in the category of treason due to violation of the Constitution.
He said in fact the PML-N did not want to hold the local body elections and the Constitution was being trampled in this regard.
In the context of agricultural trade with India, he said the government should take care of the interest of its own farmers because prices could decrease for the time being by importing potato, tomatoes, ginger but local farmers were suffering on this account.
