A Senate session has been convened today — on a Sunday in a rare move — with a one-point agenda to deliberate on the bill for the 27th Constitutional Amendment.
The 26-page Constitution (Twenty-Seventh Amendment) Act, 2025 was tabled in the Senate yesterday amid the opposition’s outcry over the pace and scope of the proposed changes, just hours after its approval by the federal cabinet.
Senate Chairperson Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani is presiding over the session today, which began with the house remembering Allama Iqbal on his birth anniversary.
Speaking on the 27th Amendment, PTI Senator Ali Zafar stressed that the Constitution was a contract between the state and the public, with a “spirit of its own”. He added that the document was a pledge that everyone, regardless of the region they hailed from, would live according to the laws.
“When you make any change in the Constitution, it is equal to tampering with the foundation of a building, and if you make any mistake, the entire building can collapse,” he contended.
Recalling that two dictators made amendments to the 1973 Constitution that “broke it”, Zafar highlighted that even they took “a lot of time” to be passed. He added that the “real spirit” of the 1973 Constitution was returned through the 18th Amendment in 2010.
The PTI senator went on to detail “five points” that he said formed the basic spirit of the 1973 Constitution and were now being “punctured” in the 27th Amendment.
The first, he said, was that Pakistan was a federation with autonomous provinces. Secondly, the elected parliament had authority but was bound to the Constitution. Zafar said the third point was the fundamental rights provided therein, to protect and implement which courts had been formed.
Fourth pillar of the Constitution, he added, was an independent judiciary to protect people’s rights and guaranteed democracy, while the fifth one was civilian supremacy.
“If you alter this balance of five pillars even slightly through any amendment, the entire Constitution will be shaken and can result in a major chaos,” Zafar warned.
During the session, PTI lawmakers had pictures of their party founder Imran Khan placed on their desks. At the beginning of the proceedings, a PTI leader raised an objection, to which Gilani replied that as per his ruling yesterday, the senator could bring his concerns to the Senate chairman’s office.
More to follow
