ISLAMABAD, January 13, 2020: The National Assembly passed two government bills on Monday and referred a legislative proposal to the relevant committee for consideration, observes Free and Fair Election Network in its Daily Factsheet.

 Following are key observations of the House proceedings during ninth of the 18th session:

Members’ Participation

• The National Assembly met for four hours and 13 minutes; however, the proceedings remained suspended for 36 minutes due to prayer break.
• The sitting started at 1630 hours against the scheduled time of 1600 hours.
• The Speaker chaired the sitting for two hours and two minutes while remaining sitting was chaired by a member of Panel of Chairpersons.
• The Deputy Speaker was not present.
• The Leaders of the House (Prime Minister) and the Opposition did not attend the sitting.
• As many as 47 (13%) members were present at the outset and 20 (6%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of BAP, JWP, PML, GDA and PPPP attended the sitting.
• Six out of 10 minority lawmakers were present.

Output

• The House passed two government bills including the Federal Government Employees Housing Authority Bill, 2020 and the Banks (Nationalization) (Amendment) Bill, 2019.
• Minister for Religious Affairs and Inter-faith Harmony introduced the Protection of Communal Properties of Minorities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 which was referred to the relevant committee for consideration.
• Moved by the Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs, the House passed a motion after consensus between treasury and opposition benches to withdraw the decision of National Assembly on November 7, 2019 about consideration and passage of the Whistleblower Protection and Vigilance Commission Bill, 2019 which was promulgated as Ordinance and later presented in the House. The Chair also referred this bill to the committee.
• Two bills on the agenda were not considered which were the Federal Public Service Commission (Validation of Rules) Bill, 2019 and the University of Islamabad Bill, 2019.
• Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs presented the first Quarterly Report of the Board of Directors of State Bank of Pakistan on the state of the Economy for the year 2019-2020.

Representation and Responsiveness

• Minister for Energy responded to two Calling Attention Notices which were referred to the relevant committee. These notices were regarding gas load shedding and stoppage of ongoing gas supply projects in Punjab and non-provision of Gas to Sindh.
• A motion of thanks expressing gratitude to the President for his address to Parliament was not taken up.

 Order and Institutionalization

• As many as 22 lawmakers including Minister for Energy and Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs spoke on points of order for an hour and 24 minutes.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on January 14, 2020 (Tuesday) 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