A DEMOCRACY needs an effective parliament. Has Pakistan’s parliament lived up to this responsibility? The evidence suggests it hasn’t. Parliament has underperformed. It has acted as little more than a rubber-stamp for the present government. This reflects a broader trend of democratic erosion in the country in recent years.

Several reports offer telling insights into parliament’s functioning. The most recent was released last week by a civil society organisation. It records the low attendance of members of the National Assembly in its proceedings.

According to Fafen (Free and Fair Election Network), only 20 per cent of MNAs attended all sittings of the Lower House in the 27th session in May. Thirty-three members did not show up for any sitting. The prime minister was absent from all nine sittings as were some ministers. The leader of the opposition, however, attended all of them. As many as 267 members out of 333 skipped at least one sitting of the session.

An earlier report by Pildat (Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency) evaluated the National Assembly’s performance in the parliamentary year March 2025 to February 2026. It also found low attendance by members. The report pointed out that the Assembly’s lack of quorum was raised 19 times, with eight sittings adjourned due to the absence of members. Despite this low and declining engagement by MNAs, the ruling party has made no effort to address the recurring problem of empty benches.

Attendance is not the only indicator of parliamentary conduct. What matters most is how it performs its legislative and deliberative functions. This is arguably the most unedifying aspect of its performance. It is due principally to the attitude of the government, which enjoys a simple majority in the Assembly, but with its ally, the PPP, it has a two-thirds majority. The way constitutional amendments have been bulldozed through parliament in the past two years is a striking illustration of its attitude to parliamentary institutions.

A parliament that doesn’t assert itself surrenders its authority to others.

In 2024, when parliament adopted the 26th Constitutional Amendment, it was done in the darkness of night. Even the final text was not made available to lawmakers before it was tabled. The entire legislative process lacked transparency. It was over in hours, without any debate on an amendment of far-reaching implications for judicial independence. The controversial amendment made the judiciary subservient to the executive and seriously undermined the rule of law. Official coercion to secure the required two-thirds vote robbed the entire process of legitimacy.

The adoption of the 27th Constitutional Amendment in November 2025 followed a similar path. It was passed in just a couple of days. There was hardly any debate other than some speeches from treasury benches during which the opposition walked out. The amendment struck at the heart of the Constitution. It involved structural changes in the country’s judicial system including the creation of a Federal Constitutional Court, restructuring of the military high command and grant of sweeping constitutional privileges and immunities to key officeholders.

It sparked intense public controversy and evoked much criticism from the opposition, legal community, media and civil society. It was widely seen as another power grab by the executive. But again, the government rushed through the process. Treasury members and their allies made no effort to press for a full debate.

Another controversial bill, rushed through the NA in January 2026, was the Elections (Amendment) Bill. This limited public access to MPs’ asset statements by granting discretionary power to the Assembly Speaker or Senate chairman to withhold disclosures on unspecified ‘security grounds’. Opposition objections were cast aside to a law that undermined the principle of accountability of parliamentary members. These examples show how parliament has acted as a handmaiden of the executive. It has rubber-stamped actions that aggrandised the establishment’s powers.

As it is the majority party that sets the tone and substance for parliamentary activity, its stance is the principal reason for turning this Assembly into a passive and largely ineffective body. The PML-N leadership sees parliament as a means to maintain its party in power rather than as an instrument of governance or forum to articulate and debate policy. As in its previous stints in government, the party has not encouraged the Assembly to play an active role in both its legislative and deliberative functions.

With its majority, the ruling party should not be reluctant to encourage open parliamentary debate and allow members to freely deliberate on national issues. But it doesn’t see the value of parliamentary debate. It also doesn’t recognise the utility of parliament as a forum to ventilate opinion, change opinion and share opinion. Whether this reflects lack of confidence in its own backbenchers or understanding of how parliament should function, the outcome is marginalisation of the legislature’s role in the political system.

The PPP has also contributed to this outcome by not pushing for debate on key national and foreign policy issues or insisting that constitutional amendments should be deliberated upon and not rushed through the two chambers. As for the opposition, it has had to face incessant obstacles put in its path by an authoritarian set-up.

Even so, it has tried to generate pressure for debate and subject government actions to critical scrutiny. But its frequent walkouts and boycotts, albeit in protest against efforts to muzzle its voice, have proven to be counterproductive. It has left the field open for treasury benches to do whatever they want.

Parliament is as good as its members. Many are adept in constituency politics and are products of a culture of patronage. For them, a seat means a ticket to an elite club and access to state resources to shore up their local power base. Attendance is secondary and policy debates of little interest. The result is weak parliamentary oversight of executive actions.

Elected representatives repeatedly declare their commitment to parliamentary supremacy. But they are unwilling to lend substance to these pronouncements by their actions. Supremacy becomes a talking point, not a rulebook. A parliament that doesn’t assert itself surrenders its authority to others. A hollowed House does no service to democracy.

The writer is a former ambassador to the US, UK and UN.

Published in Dawn, June 8th, 2026

PRESIDENT Donald Trump’s mercurial personality has been under intense scrutiny in his own country and beyond. Many of his personality traits and governing style have been widely commented upon and discussed.

What is perhaps under-recognised but more consequential, especially for his foreign policy, is how he takes initiatives or starts an endeavour but never finishes them. He embarks on a course of action but doesn’t see it through to bring it to closure. Whether this is because of his short attention span, lack of staying power or consistency, the result is half-done ventures. Among the reasons for this is that he sets unrealistic objectives and when he finds they are unattainable he moves on. Trump changes course when he cannot get his own way. Rather than try to fix the issue at hand, he prefers to kick the can down the road. He switches attention almost randomly from one policy area to another, leaving issues unresolved.

The most striking illustration of Trump’s unfinished ventures is his Gaza peace plan announced with such fanfare seven months ago. Instead of following through with his own 20-point plan, he decided to attack Iran along with Israel. This shift in focus left the Gaza plan at best in limbo but also in disarray. Yes, there is a ceasefire. But it is constantly violated by Israeli attacks, which have claimed the lives of over 700 Palestinians since it came into force in October 2025. Israel occupies over half of Gaza and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now ordered his military to seize 70 per cent of the Strip. The withdrawal of Israeli forces, envisaged by Trump’s plan, never got underway. In fact, what was set out as a multiphase plan didn’t go beyond the first phase. The much-touted international stabilisation force has neither been assembled nor deployed.

President Trump embarks on a course of action but often doesn’t bring it to closure.

Little if anything is heard about the so-called Board of Peace established in January 2026, which Trump described as the most consequential organisation the world had seen. It was given responsibility for the reconstruction of Gaza but that hasn’t even started. Instead, reports indicate the organisation is mired in legal and political problems and the official fund for the Board has no cash. The building of a ‘New Gaza’ supposed to transform the territory into the “riviera of the Middle East” is nowhere on the horizon. The residents of Gaza continue to struggle in dire humanitarian conditions amid massive devastation. This is the shambolic state of Trump’s Gaza peace plan either because he has lost interest or simply shifted priorities to the war on Iran.

Another example of Trump’s unfinished diplomatic interventions is his administration’s efforts to end the Ukraine war, now in its fourth year, though eclipsed by the Middle East crisis. This is the war Trump promised to end in “24 hours” and which he proclaimed would never have started on his watch. He first tried to get Ukraine to accept a plan favourable to Russia saying Ukraine had “no cards” to play. When Kyiv resisted, a 20-point peace plan was agreed between the US and Ukraine in December 2025 aimed at ending the war. But over the past year, Trump routinely insulted the Ukrainian leadership, paused military aid to Ukraine and kept changing his position even while striking a minerals deal with Kyiv. He threatened to impose sanctions on Russia but never made good on this. His administration pursued on and off negotiations with Russia and sought to broker talks between Kyiv and Moscow in trilateral meetings.

Hopes that Trump’s summit meeting in August 2025 with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska would yield a deal or even a ceasefire came to naught. Trump himself raised expectations that he would secure a commitment from Putin for a truce. When he failed, he claimed the best way to end the conflict was to “go directly to a peace agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere ceasefire agreement, which often do not hold up”. Subsequent peace talks made little progress much less produce a breakthrough. Talks stalled in February with Ukrainian officials believing the Trump administration was reluctant to mount pressure on Putin. Before leaving for China, Trump still claimed a settlement between Ukraine and Russia was getting “very close”. But Russian officials countered there was no clear plan to end the war. Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio acknowledged last month that the peace process on Ukraine had stagnated and said Washington was not interested in “endless meetings that lead to nothing”. As the war in Ukraine grinds on, there is slim possibility of reviving peace talks even after the Iran war ends. Both warring sides seem to have lost faith in the process with President Volodymyr Zelensky said to have given up on the US president. This means another diplomatic effort by Trump, which he claimed would be quick and easy to conclude, has not been brought to a close.

While the world waits to see when Trump will close on the Iran war the question is whether he is able to do so in a way consistent with his stated objectives. The no-war, no-peace state of play and diplomatic impasse can continue for weeks if not months. For Trump, the political and economic costs are very high of leaving the Middle East crisis to fester and move on without any resolution. This time it would be hard for him to leave without a deal even though he seems unwilling to accept that it cannot just be on his terms. Also, closure means a lasting deal that ensures there is no return to war, not just an extension of a short-term ceasefire.

The consequences of Trump’s unfinished diplomatic ventures and interventions are obviously detrimental to America’s global standing. They sow doubts about US reliability among Washington’s allies and encourage rivals and adversaries to hold their ground and wait it out rather than show any accommodation. Moreover, when the US does not complete what it starts and moves on leaving behind unfinished business, it loses credibility. That inevitably weakens its position in the world.

The writer is a former ambassador to the US, UK and UN.

Published in Dawn, June 1st, 2026