• Refers two bills to committees
• Opposition continues protest, demands resignation of PM

ISLAMABAD, April 25, 2017: The Punjab Assembly adopted three Private Members’ resolutions and referred two bills to the committees on Tuesday, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are some key observations of the House proceedings during second sitting of 28^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The Punjab Assembly met for an hour and 55 minutes.
• The sitting started at 1137 hours against the scheduled time of 1000 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the entire sitting while the Deputy Speaker was not present.
• The Chief Minister did not attend the sitting.
• The Leader of the Opposition attended the sitting for 34 minutes.
• Fifty lawmakers (13%) were present at the outset and 37 (10%) at the adjournment of sitting.
• The Parliamentary leader of JI attended the sitting.
• Five minority members were present.

Output

• PML-N and PPPP lawmakers introduced the Punjab Private Educational Institutions (Promotion and Regulation) (Amendment) Bill 2017 and the Punjab Tobacco Vend (Amendment) Bill 2017 separately, which were referred to the relevant standing committees.
• The House rejected a PPPP lawmakers’ motion seeking leave to introduce the Punjab Child Marriage Restraints (Amendment) Bill 2017 while another bill with identical name was not taken up due to absence of the mover.
• The House adopted three Private Members’ resolutions making recommendations to the government to provide incinerators to District Headquarters Hospitals, declare police officials martyrs who die during the course of their duty and take action against indecent advertisements on public transport.
• A PTI lawmaker’s resolution urging the government to cancel route permits of vehicles with unsafe CNG cylinders was rejected.
• The House deferred three resolutions appearing on the agenda.

Representation and Responsiveness

• As many as seven out of 15 Starred Questions were responded to by the government during Question Hour while four questions were disposed of and as many were deferred due to absence of the movers. The lawmakers also asked 13 supplementary questions.
• The House deferred an Adjournment Motion of a PML-N lawmaker.

Order and Institutionalization

• The lawmakers spoke on 11 Points of Order consuming 10 minutes of the proceedings.
• Two PTI lawmakers pointed out quorum at 1247 hours and 1300 hours, however, it was found complete on both counts after the ringing of bells for five minutes.
• The entire opposition protested on the floor of the House for 23 minutes demanding resignation of the Prime Minister.

Transparency

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

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The daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Punjab Assembly proceedings conducted by PATTAN Development Organization – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted