KP Assembly Suspends Agenda to Honour APS Victims

ISLAMABAD, December 16, 2016: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Assembly suspended its regular agenda on Friday to commemorate second anniversary of the martyrs of terror attack on Army Public School (APS) Peshawar two years ago, says Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

The House witnessed exchange of heated arguments between treasury and PML-N lawmakers when Parliamentary Leader of Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz addressed the Chair with his name instead of Mr. Speaker.

Following are some key observations of the House proceedings during 19th sitting of 21st session:

Members’ Participation

  • The KP Assembly met for 31 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1409 hours against the scheduled time of 1400 hours.
  • A total of 16 lawmakers (13%) were present at the start and 23 (19%) at the end of sitting.
  • The Speaker presided over the entire sitting, while the Deputy Speaker was also present.
  • The Chief Minister and the Leader of the Opposition did not attend the sitting.
  • Parliamentary leaders of JI and PML-N were present during the proceedings.
  • One minority member attended the sitting.

Representation and Responsiveness

  • A lawmaker each from JI, JUI-F, ANP, PML-N and PPPP paid tributes to the victims of APS attack on APS, Peshawar in 2014, consuming 16 minutes of the proceedings.
  • The House also offered prayers for the victims of the school attack.

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 KP Assembly’s proceedings conducted by United Rural Development Organization (URDO) – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted