ISLAMABAD:Convener World Minorities Alliance, former Federal Minister for Population Welfare, and veteran human rights defender, Julius Salik also J. Salik on Tuesday said the minorities in the country demand the government to ensure their representation through the direct vote in the general elections.
Addressing a news conference here, the former Federal Minister said it was the need of the hour and important for Pakistan as it is a signatory to the UN Minorities’ Rights declaration and protocols to provide fundamental rights to the marginalised segments of its society.
Salik said, “the Article 226 of the Constitution has been violated in all of the elections leaving every parliament elected as unconstitutional.”
He underlined that there were some 60 seats of the National Assembly reserved for women and 10 for minorities who were elected through proportionate representation which was unconstitutional.
The human rights defender mentioned that the Supreme Court’s full bench comprising 17 judges back on August 5, 2015, in their dissenting notes and directed the federal government to fill reserved minority seats by direct election and through minorities’ votes.
“Throughout my political career, I contested elections and won from all federating units. There are no corruption or misappropriation allegations levelled against me. I started my journey from the grassroots level. I got detained for seven times during Zia’s dictatorship for restoration of democracy,” he added.
J. Salik demanded that the coming elections should be held as per the constitution, whereas it was his responsibility through the platform of the Minorites’ Alliance to guide stakeholders to ensure minorities’ rights and proper representation in the legislature.
“Pakistan gives rights to all minorities but unluckily there are no nationalism promotion efforts in the country. Some 28 national centers were sold in the past that were used to support and promote nationalism in society. No nation on the earth exists without nationalism be it Iran, Oman, Qatar, the US, UK, or others,” he added.
He reiterated that the Alliance wanted the support of all stakeholders for direct elections of minorities’ representatives.
The 18th Amendment was passed without minorities’ representation whereas the amendment could not change the basic structure of the Constitution. But this time minorities should be considered to review the legislation and provide representation through direct vote, he added.
Responding to media queries, he said, “Are all political parties deaf that a violation of the constitution is being done in elections? They are naive enough to take any action despite having all means to comprehend the issue.”
He quoted Mr. Jinnah saying, “Quaid said minorities are the sacred trust of Pakistan.”
“We (Minorities) want to elect our representatives directly as per the democratic norms on our ten reserved seats. There should be a limit and we should put an end to the elections of billionaires back in the parliament,” J. Salik added.