ISLAMABAD, August 9, 2021: The Balochistan Assembly passed two government bills and adopted a resolution on Monday, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during the third sitting of the 42nd session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for an hour and 51 minutes.
• The sitting started at 05:50 pm against the scheduled time of 04:00 pm.
• The deputy speaker presided over the entire sitting in the absence of speaker.
• The leader of the House (Chief Minister) did not attend the sitting.
• The opposition leader attended the entire sitting.
• As many as 16 MPAs (25 percent) were present at the outset and 19 (29 percent) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of MMAP, PkMAP, BNP-A and BNP-M attended the proceedings.
• All three minority lawmakers were present.

 Output

• The House passed two government bills including the Balochistan Board of Technical and Vocational Education Bill, 2021 and Balochistan Trust (Amendment) Bill, 2021.
• A bill – the Balochistan Arms Bill, 2021 – was referred to the relevant committee after its introduction in the House.
• The House adopted a resolution recommending the federal and provincial governments to ensure welfare steps for elderly people especially those above to 70 years.

Representation and Responsiveness  

• The House took up five out of ten starred questions while five questions were deferred due to absence of relevant minister. In addition, lawmakers asked nine supplementary questions.

Order and Institutionalization

• A lawmaker spoke on a point of order related to blast in Quetta.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on Thursday, August 12, 2021 at 04:00 pm.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and others.
• The attendance of lawmakers was not available to the observers and media.

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Balochistan Assembly proceedings conducted by Center for Peace and Development (CPD) – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted