Regulatory Framework for Legislative Drafting in Pakistan: Challenges and a Way Forward

Abstract

It is widely accepted that the regulatory framework for legislative drafting addresses many legal challenges, including turning policy into legislation, the intelligibility of legislative expression, interpretation of statutes, and the rule of law. It leads the administration of justice towards achieving desired policy objectives. Without a predictable legislative drafting regulatory framework, the drafting quality causes failure to achieve desired policy objective, lack of rule of law, ambiguity, unintelligibility, and unpredictability of legislation. However, it is equally true that many of these challenges are prevalent to a large extent in Pakistan. The deficiency of legislative drafting regulatory practices, expertise, and deficient legislative expression impedes the enforcement of laws and administration of justice in Pakistan. It is quite apparent that the legislative drafting problems faced in the heterogeneous society of Pakistan appear to be more critical than any other larger county. The article exposes the necessity for Pakistan to adopt, special procedures, policies, and infrastructure based on internationally recognized principles of legislative drafting for intelligible, clear, and predictable legislation.