ISLAMABAD, June 12, 2017: The National Assembly, on Monday, continued the general discussion on the budget amidst opposition’s boycott of the proceedings, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN).

Following are key observations of the proceedings during 13th sitting of the 43rd session:

 Members’ Participation

• The National Assembly met for two hours and seven minutes.
• The sitting started at 1650 hours against the scheduled time of 1600 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the sitting for an hour and 53 minutes while the Deputy Speaker chaired the rest of the sitting.
• The Leader of the House (Prime Minister) did not attend the sitting while the Leader of the Opposition was present for 53 minutes.
• As many as 104 lawmakers (30%) were present at the outset and 53 (15%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PPPP, JI, QWP-S, PkMAP, ANP, AMLP and APML attended the sitting.
• Five minority lawmakers were also present.

Representation and Responsiveness

• Three lawmakers participated in the general discussion on the budget consuming 39 minutes of the proceedings.

Order and Institutionalization

• The lawmakers spoke on six Points of Order consuming an hour and 13 minutes.
• The lawmakers belonging to PTI and PML-N protested against each other for two minutes after a PTI lawmaker’s speech was disrupted by a PML-N lawmaker.
• The entire opposition walked out from proceedings at 1743 hours against refusal of the government to telecast the opposition lawmakers’ budget speeches. They did not return to the House.

Transparency

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

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