ISLAMABAD, May 21, 2021: The Punjab Assembly deferred debate on agriculture and did not consider six zero hour notices appearing on the agenda, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet on Friday.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during the second sitting of the 32nd session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for an hour and 16 minutes.
• The sitting started at 10:55 am against the scheduled time of 09:00 am.
• The speaker and the deputy speaker were absent.
• A member of panel of chairpersons presided over the entire sitting.
• The leader of the House (chief minister) did not attend the sitting.
• The opposition leader attended the sitting for an hour and one minute.
• As many as 23 MPAs (six percent) were present at the outset and 73 (20 percent) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leader of PPPP attended the sitting while parliamentary leader of Pakistan Rah-e-Haq (PRH) was absent.
• Two out of eight minority lawmakers attended the sitting.

Output

• Minister for law presented two statutory reports which were the referred to the Public Accounts Committee-II.
• The House deferred the general discussion on Agriculture following the request of Minister for law. The debate will now start in the next sitting on May 24, 2021.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House took up three out of 35 starred questions related to Livestock and Dairy Development Department. Besides, the lawmakers asked eight supplementary questions.
• Minister for law and the opposition leader condemned Israeli aggression against Palestinians and debated the issue for 35 minutes.
• The House did not consider six zero hour notices on the agenda.

Order and Institutionalization

• Two lawmakers spoke on points of order for six minutes related to inappropriate behaviour of security officials with the opposition members.
• The PML-N lawmakers protested for two minutes during the proceedings when PTI lawmakers interrupted the opposition leader during his speech on the Palestinian issue.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on Monday, May 24, 2021 at 02:00 pm.

Transparency

• ‘List of Business’ was available on Punjab Assembly’s website.
• Information on Members’ attendance is available on Punjab Assembly’s website.

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This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Punjab Assembly proceedings conducted by SANGAT Development Foundation, a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted.