The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) decision to disengage from the parliamentary process expanded to the Senate this week, as party-backed senators began resigning from standing committees in line with directives issued by party founder Imran Khan.
Following the departure of several PTI lawmakers from National Assembly committees last week, Senator Mirza Muhammad Afridi confirmed his resignation from five key Senate standing committees, including Commerce, Industries and Production, Education, Energy, and Inter-Provincial Coordination.
Speaking on the decision, Senator Afridi stated that he was stepping down on the instructions of the party’s founder. “I am relinquishing my committee memberships in compliance with the directive issued by the party’s founder,” he said in a brief statement.
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He was joined by senior PTI leader and former federal minister Senator Azam Khan Swati, who also resigned from five Senate committees — Cabinet, Economic Affairs, Health, Law and Justice, and Rules and Procedure.
In a strongly worded statement, Swati described the move as a protest against the existing parliamentary system. “These resignations are meant to register our opposition to a system that has lost its ability to uphold constitutional order and the rule of law,” he said. Swati added that he had submitted his resignation to PTI’s parliamentary leader in the Senate, Senator Ali Zafar, who would forward them to the Senate Chairman.
The resignations follow a clear directive issued by PTI founder Imran Khan just a day earlier, instructing all PTI-affiliated senators to step down from their respective committee roles.
The move is widely seen as part of the party’s broader political strategy to signal its rejection of what it claims is a manipulated and illegitimate parliamentary setup.
The Senate resignations come on the heels of a similar exodus in the National Assembly, where the party began its withdrawal from committees last month.
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The first major resignation came from Junaid Akbar, who stepped down as Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). His departure was soon followed by a wave of resignations submitted by PTI lawmakers, with Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan formally handing over 18 resignations to the National Assembly Speaker’s office.
PTI Secretary Information Sheikh Waqas Akram also resigned from the PAC and the Standing Committee on Information, reinforcing the party’s position that it would no longer participate in parliamentary business.
Among those who resigned from NA committee chairmanships and memberships were Junaid Akbar, Sahibzada Saifullah, Mahboob Shah, Shahzada Gustasab, Ali Jadoon, Mujahid Ali, Malik Anwar Taj, Fazal Muhammad Khan, and Sajid Khan. The list further included Arbab Amir Ayub, Asif Khan, Sheikh Waqas Akram, Arshad Sahi, Malik Amir Dogar, Shabbir Ali Qureshi, and Awais Jhakkar.
