Punjab Assembly Lauds Role of Women in Nation Building

ISLAMABAD, March 10, 2020: The Punjab Assembly adopted a resolution on Tuesday to pay tribute to women for their role in politics and nation-building, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during second sitting of the 20th session:

Members’ Participation

  • The House met for two an hour and 31 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1644 hours against the scheduled time of 1500 hours.
  • The Speaker presided over the entire sitting.
  • The Deputy Speaker was not present.
  • The Leaders of the House and the Opposition did not attend the sitting.
  • As many as 56 (15%) MPAs were present at the outset and 63 (17%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
  • A parliamentary leader of PPPP attended the proceedings.
  • As many as six out of eight minority lawmakers attended the sitting.

Output

  • The House unanimously adopted a private resolution to express condolence over the demise of renowned politician Malik Ata Muhammad Khan.
  • Moved as supplementary agenda, the House also adopted a resolution to pay tribute to Pakistani women for their contribution to politics and nation-building. Three women lawmakers – PTI (two), PML-N (one) – spoke on it for 12 minutes.
  • The House rejected a resolution demanding to declare provision of clean drinking water as constitutional right while another resolution about legislation for paying group insurance amount to retired government servants was deferred.

Representation and Responsiveness

  • The House took up ten out of 31 starred questions. In addition, the lawmakers asked 20 supplementary questions.

 Order and Institutionalization

  • As many as two lawmakers spoke on Points of Order for 12 minutes.
  • The House was adjourned to meet again on March 11, 2020 (Wednesday) at 1500 hours.

Transparency

  • ‘Orders of the Day’ was available on Assembly’s website.
  • Information on Members’ attendance is available on the Assembly’s website.

The 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 regretted