Punjab Assembly Session Prorogued Amid Low Attendance

ISLAMABAD, September 20, 2019: The 14th session of Provincial Assembly of Punjab was prorogued on Friday amidst low attendance of lawmakers, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during fourth sitting of the 14th session:

Members’ Participation

  • The House met for an hour and 33 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1057 hours against the scheduled time of 0900 hours.
  • The Deputy Speaker presided over the entire sitting in the absence of Speaker.
  • The Leaders of the House and the Opposition did not attend the sitting.
  • As many as 25 MPAs (7%) were present at the outset and 85 (23%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
  • The parliamentary leaders of PPPP and PRHP attended the proceedings.
  • As many as six out of eight minority lawmakers attended the sitting.

Output:

  • The Provincial Minister for Law laid three reports on biannual monitoring on the implementation of NFC award for July- December 2016, January -June 2017 and July- December, 2017

Representation and Responsiveness

  • The Minister Livestock & Dairy Development Department responded to 11 out of 22 starred questions while the lawmakers asked 31 supplementary questions as well.
  • The House did not take up a Matter of Public Importance raised by a PML-N lawmaker.

Order and Institutionalization

  • PPPP lawmakers staged a walkout from the proceedings for eight minutes against use of objectionable language by treasury lawmakers during speech of their parliamentary leader.
  • The session was prorogued sine die.

 Transparency

  • ‘Orders of the Day’ and attendance of the lawmakers is available on the website of the Provincial Assembly of Punjab.

The daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Punjab Assembly proceedings conducted by PATTAN Development Organization – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are regretted