ISLAMABAD, May 11, 2018: The National Assembly did not wind up the debate on Federal Budget 2018-19 amidst lack of quorum on Friday, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the proceedings during the ninth sitting of the 56^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The National Assembly met for two hours and 33 minutes.
• The sitting started at 1034 hours against the scheduled time of 1030 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the sitting for 26 minutes  while the rest of the proceedings were chaired by the Deputy Speaker.
• The Leader of the House (Prime Minister) and the Opposition Leader did not attend the sitting.
• As many as 33 lawmakers (10%) were present at the outset and 72 (21%) at the adjournment of sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PkMAP, JI, ANP, QWP, PML-Z, NP and PPPP attended the sitting.
• Six minority lawmakers were present.

Output

• Tabled by Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, the House adopted a resolution to form Former Parliamentarians Forum to resolve the problems of the former members of National Assembly.
• The House witnessed presentation of nine reports of various Standing Committees on as many bills while the report of Federal Public Service Commission for the year 2016 was also presented.

Representation and Responsiveness  

• Ten lawmakers took part in the debate on annual budget 2018-19 and recommendations made by Senate to National Assembly on the Finance Bill, 2018. The discussion continued for an hour and 58 minutes.

Order and Institutionalization

• Lawmakers spoke on three points of order consuming six minutes of the proceedings.
• A lawmaker belonging to PTI pointed out the quorum at 1303 hours when the Federal Minister started winding up the discussion on the Federal Budget 2018-19. On identification of the quorum, the Chair ordered the headcount that led to the adjournment of the sitting at 1307 hours as less than one-fourth of total membership was present in the House.
• The sitting was adjourned to meet again on May 14, 2018 (Monday) at 1700 hours.

Transparency

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

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This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the National Assembly proceedings conducted by Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). Errors and omissions are excepted.