ISLAMABAD, June 4, 2021: The Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) continued pre-budget debate and took up two calling attention notices on Friday, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are the key observations of the House proceedings during the 8th sitting of the 18th session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for four hours and 50 minutes; however, the proceedings remained suspended for an hour and 40 minutes due to prayer break.
• The sitting started at 11:20 am against the scheduled time of 10:00 am.
• The speaker presided over the entire sitting.
• The deputy speaker was also present.
• The leader of the House (chief minister) was not present.
• The opposition leader attended the entire sitting.
• As many as 41 (28 percent) legislators were present at the start and 24 (17 percent) at the end of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of ANP and BAP attended the sitting.
• Three out of four minority members were present.

Output 

• The House adopted a report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and Conduct of Business Rules, Privileges and Implementation of Government Assurances.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House took up three out of five starred questions. In addition, the lawmakers asked two supplementary questions.
• The Minister of law responded to two calling attention notices related to shifting students of Govt. Girls Primary School Gujar Garhi Mardan to a new building and lack of basic amenities at a housing project of Mardan.
• The House continued debate on forthcoming budget and eight lawmakers spoke on it for an hour and 45 minutes.
• The House did not hold debate on price hike and unemployment in the province.

 Order and Institutionalization

• A PTI lawmaker pointed out quorum at 04:05 pm following which the Chair ordered the bells to be rung for four minutes. The quorum was found incomplete upon counting and the House was adjourned to meet again on Monday, June 7, 2021 at 02:00 pm.

Transparency

• ‘List of Business’ 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 the observation of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly proceedings conducted by United Rural Development Organization (URDO) – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions excepted