Sindh Assembly Defers Question Hour, CANs

ISLAMABAD, April 14, 2017: Starting 78 minutes late, the Sindh Assembly met for 34 minutes on Friday while deferring the Questions and Call Attention Notices (CANs) until next sitting, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the proceedings during third sitting of the 32nd session:

Members’ Participation

  • The Sindh Assembly met for 34 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1118 hours against the scheduled time of 1000 hours.
  • The Speaker presided over the entire sitting while the Deputy Speaker was absence.
  • The Leader of the House (Chief Minister) and the Leader of the Opposition did not attend the proceedings.
  • Thirty-two lawmakers (19%) were present at the outset and 30 (18%) at the time of adjournment of sitting.
  • The Parliamentary leaders of PPPP, MQM and PTI attended the sitting.
  • Three minority members were present.
  • Six members applied for leave.

Representation and Responsiveness

  • On government’s motion, the House deferred the Question Hour until next sitting.
  • The House also deferred four Calling Attention Notices appearing on the agenda.
  • A lawmakers belonging to PPPP spoke for four minutes on Budget Execution Report for 1st and 2nd Quarters, 2016-17.

Order and Institutionalization

  • The lawmakers spoke on two Points of Order consuming three minutes of the sitting.
  • Lawmakers belonging to MQM and PTI staged a protest over deferral of Question Hour. The protest continued for seven minutes and was followed by walkout.

Transparency

  • ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and public.
  • Attendance of lawmakers was available to the media and observers.

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Sindh Assembly proceedings conducted by Pakistan Press Foundation, a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted.