Ministerial Absence Leads to Adjournment of Balochistan Assembly Sitting

ISLAMABAD, October 20, 2020: The absence of provincial cabinet ministers during first sitting of the 28th session of Balochistan Assembly led to the adjournment of proceedings, says Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during first sitting of 28th session:

Members’ Participation

  • The House met for 18 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1748 hours against the scheduled time of 1600 hours.
  • The Speaker presided over the sitting for eight minutes while the rest of the sitting was chaired by Deputy Speaker.
  • The Leader of the House (Chief Minister) did not attend the sitting while the Leader of Opposition was present in the sitting.
  • As many as 17 (26%) MPAs were present at the outset and 19 (29%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
  • The parliamentary leaders of MMAP, PkMAP, HDP, BNP-M and PTI attended the proceedings.
  • Two minority lawmaker attended the sitting.

Output

  • The House did not take up any of the agenda item appearing on `Orders of the Day’.

 Order and Institutionalization

  • The House was adjourned to meet again on October 23, 2020 (Friday) at 1600 hours.

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 Balochistan Assembly proceedings conducted by Center for Peace and Development (CPD) – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted