KP Assembly Adjourned to Meet Again on Feb. 20, 2017

ISLAMABAD, January 27, 2017: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Assembly adopted three resolutions before being adjourned to meet again after more than three weeks, observed Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet on Friday.

Following are some key observations of the proceedings during 3rd sitting of 22nd session:

Members’ Participation

  • The KP Assembly met for an hour and 19 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1538 hours against the scheduled time of 1500 hours.
  • The House had a prayer break of 28 minutes.
  • Thirty-five lawmakers (28%) were present at the start and 33 (27%) at the end of sitting.
  • The Speaker presided over the entire sitting.
  • Deputy Speaker did not attend the sitting.
  • The Chief Minister and the Leader of the Opposition were not present.
  • Only Parliamentary leader of PML-N was present.
  • Two minority members attended the sitting.

Output

  • The House adopted three resolutions to ban porn sites, mention names of small regional languages in the forms for upcoming census and ensure legislation for Ruet-e-Hilal Committee through Parliament.
  • The House adopted three reports of various committees.

 Representation and Responsiveness

  • Three out of 11 Starred Questions appearing on the agenda were taken up while lawmakers asked two supplementary questions. One question was deferred while seven others were lapsed due to the absence of their movers.
  • A Privilege Motion of JUI-F lawmaker against Transport Department for not replying to his question was forwarded to the relevant committee.

Order and Institutionalization

  • Two Points of Order consumed six minutes of the sitting.
  • A JUI-F female lawmaker walked out of the House for two minutes when the Chair did not allow her to speak on a Point of Order.
  • The lawmakers belonging to PML-N and PTI protested by chanting slogans against each other in front of dais, following which the Speaker adjourned the sitting until February 20, 2017.

Transparency

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

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the KP Assembly proceedings conducted by United Rural Development Organization (URDO) – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted