ISLAMABAD, January 15, 2016: The proceeding of the National Assembly remained suspended for 37 minutes due to lack of quorum on Friday during tenth sitting of 28^th session, says Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN).

Following are some key observations of the House proceeding:

Members’ Participation in House Proceedings

• The National Assembly met for two hours and 32 minutes.
• The proceeding of the House remained suspended for 37 minutes due to lack of quorum.
• The sitting started at 1038 hours against its scheduled time of 1030 hours.
• The Speaker chaired the sitting for 85 minutes while a member of the Panel of Chairpersons presided over the rest of the proceeding.
• The Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition were not present.
• Ten Federal Ministers attended the sitting.
• 43 MNAs (13%) were present at outset and 10 (3%) at adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PML-F, JI, APML and AMLP were present.
• Eight minority members were present.

Output

• The Minister for Science & Technology introduced the National University of Sciences and Technology (Amendment) Bill, 2016. The bill was referred to the relevant standing committee.
• Chairman Standing Committee on Finance, Revenue, Economic Affairs, Statistics and Privatization presented four reports of the committee on the Offences in Respect of Banks (Special Courts) (Amendment) Bill, 2015, the Banks (Nationalization) (Amendment) Bill, 2015, the Equity Participation Fund (Repeal) Bill, 2014 and the Income Tax (Amendment) Bill, 2016. The House passed with majority vote a motion seeking to condone the delay in presentation of first three of these reports.
• Chairman Standing Committee on Industries & Production presented the Periodical Report of the Committee for the period from January, 2015 to June, 2015.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House took up three out of 46 starred questions appearing on agenda. The members asked four supplementary questions as well.
• The government replied to 10 out of 33 unstarred questions appearing on agenda. The Question Hour continued only for 13 minutes.
• The House took up two Calling Attention Notices regarding increasing smoking trends and not providing the benefit of recent reduction in the prices of electricity to the consumers of less than 300 electricity units.
• Two lawmakers spoke on a motion of thanks to the President for his address to the Parliament.

Order and Institutionalization

• Nine lawmakers spoke on Points of Order consuming 14 minutes of the proceeding. They discussed the issues relating to Saudi-Iran controversy, recent power break down in the country, attack on PIA office in India and teachers protest in Islamabad.
• An independent lawmaker pointed out the quorum eight minutes after the start of the sitting which led to the suspension of proceeding for 37 minutes.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and public.
• The attendance of lawmakers is available on website of National Assembly.

  To download the factsheet, click here for English version – click here for Urdu version

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