Interim Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar said on Saturday that social order can \u201cnever ever be compromised for the rule of law\u201d as he emphasised striking a balance between the two.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are committed and understand that the performance and the participatory idea of democracy is what is needed but at the same time, you have to strike a balance \u2014 there\u2019s a rule of law and then there\u2019s a rule of order,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n
The premier passed these remarks during an interactive session with a delegation of students from Harvard, who are in Pakistan on a visit. The students had also interacted with Chief of Army Staff Gen Asim Munir yesterday.<\/p>\n
A number of topics came up for discussion in the meeting today, including the state of democracy, the economy, brain drain and the challenges Pakistan is facing with terrorism.<\/p>\n
Interacting with the students on the future of democracy in Pakistan, PM Kakar said the \u201cincomplete completion of tenure of any government is not at all undemocratic\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cDemocracy gives a guarantee to the strength of the Parliament and in Pakistan\u2019s case, last 15 years post-2008, we had successive three stints of Parliament,\u201d he said, adding that the Parliament could be changed through constitutional means which has happened in the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have to agree that members of the Parliament have the inherent right to emplace or replace a government.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have not seen any act in the past 15 years where the case has been otherwise,\u201d he asserted, stressing that \u201cdemocracy is a process not an event\u201d.<\/p>\n
In an indirect reference to India, he said, \u201cIn our neighbourhood, the ritual of democracy has been exercised for the last seven decades but it is heading towards electoral autocracy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIs this the kind of democracy you would envision and want to have for the USA or UK or France? I don\u2019t think so.\u201d<\/p>\n
Putting weight behind striking the balance between the rule of law and the rule of order, he said: \u201cIn Pakistan\u2019s context, there are times where the normal laws get suspended or are not the solution to the kind of challenges we face, like our security challenge \u2026 so the priority is that you first secure life, secure social and political order and later on you go for issues of civil liberties, democratic principles so on and so forth.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Interim Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar said on Saturday that social order can \u201cnever ever be compromised for the rule of law\u201d as he emphasised striking a balance between the two. \u201cWe are committed and understand that the performance and the participatory idea of democracy is what is needed but at the same time, you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":351809,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-351806","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-news"},"yoast_head":"\n