ISLAMABAD, January 7, 2020: The National Assembly passed three government bills on Tuesday seeking to amend the procedures for appointment and extension of armed forces’ chiefs and the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, observes Free and Fair Election Network in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during the 5^th sitting of 18^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The National Assembly met for 25 minutes.
• The sitting started at 1140 hours against the scheduled time of 1100 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the entire sitting.
• The Deputy Speaker was not present.
• The Leader of the House (Prime Minister) attended the entire sitting.
• The Leader of the Opposition did not attend the sitting.
• As many as 191 (56%) were present at the outset and 257 (75%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PPPP, PML-N, AMLP, MMAP, PML, MQM and BAP attended the sitting.
• Eight out of 10 minority lawmakers were present.

Output

• Chairman Standing Committee on Defence presented the reports of the committee on the Pakistan Army (Amendment) Bill, 2020; Pakistan Air Force (Amendment) Bill, 2020 and Pakistan Navy (Amendment) Bill, 2020. These bills were referred to the committee on January 3, 2020 after their introduction in the House.
• Moved by the Minister for Defence, the House waived off the requirement of giving the members two days to read the committee reports on the above-mentioned bills and immediately proceeded to the clause-by-clause consideration and subsequently to the passage of these bills. The lawmakers belonging to PPPP withdrew their amendments to the bill on the request of the mover. The passage of the bills took place in the absence of the lawmakers belonging to MMAP and two independents. All parties present during the voting process voted in favour of the bills.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House did not consider two Calling Attention Notices and a motion of thanks.

  Order and Institutionalization

• As many as two lawmakers spoke on points of order for two minutes.
• MMAP lawmakers walked out of the House at 1153 hours and did not take part in the voting on the bills. Two Independent lawmakers from erstwhile FATA also followed them at 1155 hours. The protesting lawmakers did not return to the proceedings till the adjournment.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on January 8, 2020 (Wednesday) at 1600 hours.

Transparency

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

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