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“As God is my witness, I did not sign Official Secrets Amendment Bill 2023 & Pakistan Army Amendment Bill 2023 as I disagreed with these laws,” Pakistan President Arif Alvi posted on X Sunday (August 20).
With these words, Alvi triggered one of the most absurd political controversies of all time in Pakistan.
Hours after the President’s statement, a gazette notification issued by the Senate Secretariat surfaced, stating that the two bills were “deemed to have been assented by the president”.
So, what exactly happened? How could two bills be given presidential assent without the president actually signing them? And what has the fallout of this controversy been? While there are still many facets of this story that remain unclear, we try to piece together what is known.
So far, there has not been any official statement from the Pakistan President’s office – the only piece of communication from him is his social media post. President Alvi claims that his staff disobeyed him and “undermined his authority”.
“I asked my staff to return the bills unsigned within stipulated time to make them ineffective. I confirmed from them many times that whether they have been returned & was assured that they were. However I have found out today that my staff undermined my will and command,” his post on X read.
On the other hand, the law ministry, currently functioning on an interim basis till general elections are held later this year, accused Alvi of “not taking responsibility for his own actions”, calling his statement “a matter of great concern”.
“The President has two options: either give assent, or refer the matter to the parliament with specific observations,” the ministry said in a statement, adding that the president had not fulfilled either option. “Such a course of action is against the letter and spirit of the constitution,” it said.
“As the president didn’t sign and return the bill within 10 days, it became a law,” caretaker law minister Ahmad Iran told a press conference.
“It is just an attempt to create confusion. It has no legal value,” caretaker Information Minister Murtaza Solangi said in the same presser.
Under Article 75(1) of the Pakistani Constitution, after a bill has passed through both the National Assembly and the Senate, it is presented to the President for his assent. The President, at this juncture, has two options – either to give assent within 10 days or to return the bill along with his objections to the legislature.
If the legislature passes it again, with or without incorporating the president’s objections, as per the Constitution, “the President shall give his assent within ten days, failing which such assent shall be deemed to have been given.”
There are two things to note over here. First, the concept of “deemed assent” only kicks in with bills that have already been sent back to the Parliament by the President one time.
“Please note no where does 75(1) provide that if President has not assented to the Bill within 10 days it will automatically be deemed that the President has assent and the Bill becomes an Act (law),” Jibran Nasir, lawyer and legal rights activist, said on X.
So, what happens if the president, say, does not do anything within the stipulated time of ten days? Article 254 of the Constitution sheds light to this issue.
“When any act or thing is required by the Constitution to be done within a particular period and it is not done within that period, the doing of the act or thing shall not be invalid or other-wise ineffective by reason only that it was not done within that period,” the Article says.
This means that even though the stipulated time might have lapsed, the President is still within his rights to send the bill back to the legislature, with his objections.
The second second thing to note is this: what would the impact of the President sending back a bill with his objections be?
While normally, the bill would simply be up for discussion once again in a joint sitting of both the houses of Parliament, since the National Assembly has been dissolved, President Alvi was in an unusually “powerful” position.
“If he returned the bills, he would essentially have killed them because there was no National Assembly to pass the bills,” lawyer Usama Khawar told Pakistani daily Dawn.
As per legal experts from Pakistan, there are serious questions regarding the validity of both the passed bills which became laws after “presidential assent”.
“In simple terms, the president is saying that key legal amendments have become law through fraud and subterfuge,” Jibran Nasir noted. Now, he “must immediately sack all those involved”, Nasir wrote on Instagram.
Similarly, lawyer Usama Khawar also flagged issues with the validity of the laws, telling Dawn that “there now existed strong legal grounds for the court to declare that … [the two laws] were not validly enacted acts.”
Referring to the press conference held by the interim law and communication ministers, lawyer Reema Omer posted on X: “Art 75 doesn’t provide for “deemed assent” if the President fails to give assent within ten days in the first instance. How can these two bills be considered Acts of Parliament?”
PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) – Imran Khan’s party under whose ticket Alvi contested elections in 2018, before being made president – has said it will reach out to Pakistan’s apex court on this matter.
Perhaps the primary reason for these laws courting so much controversy is their content. Widely criticised by the opposition as “undemocratic”, both the amendments widen the ambit of the state to prosecute people for acts against the state and the military.
Particularly controversial, in this law, is its broadening of the definition of “enemy” – as per legal scholars, this section “against the principles of natural justice” as it treats unintentional contact at par with planned espionage, Dawn reported.
“Any person who is directly or indirectly, intentionally or unintentionally working for or engaged with a foreign power, foreign agent, non-state actor, organisation, entity, association or group guilty of a particular act … prejudicial to the safety and interest of Pakistan,” it reads.
Section 6-A of the Act also creates a new offence of unauthorised disclosure of the identities of members of intelligence agencies, informants or sources, to be punishable by up to three years imprisonment and a fine of up to Rs 10 million.
The Army Act amendment bill paves the way for the punishment of up to five-year rigorous imprisonment to any person guilty of disclosing any information, acquired in an official capacity that is or may be prejudicial to the security and interest of Pakistan or the armed forces, Dawn reported.
Particularly controversial, are sections of the act which accord more powers to the army chief and bar ex-servicemen from engaging in politics as well as taking up ventures, which could come into conflict with the army’s interest.
The Act also proposes imprisonment for defamation of the army. Section 55-C states that a person who “intentionally ridicules, scandalises, brings into hatred or otherwise attempts to lower the armed forces of Pakistan or any part will be punished with imprisonment which may extend to two years or fine or with both”.
These laws were passed swiftly (within a day) in the fag end of the Pakistani National Assembly’s tenure, under questionable circumstances. A number of members protested the government’s move to push the amendment through in haste, saying that they had not even been provided copies of the proposed legislation.
As per Dawn, “A bare perusal of the proposed law suggests that it was drafted while keeping in mind the May 9 violence, which erupted after the first arrest of PTI chief Imran Khan that day.”
According to critics of the government, these laws will expand the power of the army and the state to persecute opponents and activists. A day before President Alvi released his statement, PTI Vice Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi was arrested in connection with a first information report registered on Aug 15 under the Official Secrets Act.
At the heart of this controversy is Pakistan’s ongoing political crisis. The tension between the ruling coalition of Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) and Pakistan Peoples’ Party, and Imran Khan’s PTI is reflected in the widely divergent reactions to Alvi’s claims.
While PPP and PML-N leaders have bashed Alvi for his statements, PTI has hailed him as “taking a stand for the Constitution”.
PTI leader Farrukh Habib said that the “extremely shocking” development was akin to the “collapse of the whole system”. “Lawyers community of the country should stand up for the supremacy of the constitution now,” he said.
On the other hand, PPP Vice President Sherry Rehman called for the President’s resignation. “Does he want to say that someone else signs the bills under his nose? If this is so then the president should immediately resign from his office. If your staff is not in your control then leave the presidential office,” she said in a statement.
Arif Alvi, still seen as “Imran’s man” has been steadfast in his opposition to the current government. Just last week, he killed over a dozen bills by sending them back to the Parliament.
