ISLAMABAD, December 13, 2018: The Provincial Assembly of Punjab addressed its scheduled business on Thursday amidst opposition’s walkout for the production of a detained PML-N lawmaker in the House, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during ninth sitting of the fifth session:

Members’ Participation

• The Assembly met for an hour and 27 minutes.
• The sitting started at 1212 hours against the scheduled time of 1100 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the entire sitting while the Deputy speaker was also present.
• The Leaders of the House and the Opposition did not attend the sitting.
• As many as 80 MPAs (22%) were present at the outset and 100 (27%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PPPP and Rah-e-Haq Party attended the proceedings.
• As many as six out of eight minority lawmakers attended the sitting.

 

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House adopted a motion by Minister for Women Development to discuss the Annual Report of the Punjab Commission on the Status of Women for the year 2016. The discussion will take place in the next sitting.
• The House deferred two Call Attention Notices (CANs) due to absence of the movers.
• The House referred a PTI lawmaker’s Adjournment Motion (AM) regarding a property-grabbing case to the Special Committee-I with the direction to present its report within a month.

• The House took up two Starred Questions while three questions were deferred due to absence of movers. These questions were addressed to the ministries of Cooperatives, Industries, Commerce & Investment and Youth Affairs & Sports. The lawmakers asked four supplementary questions as well.

 Order and Institutionalization

• The lawmakers raised 18 Points of Order consuming 37 minutes of the proceedings.
• The lawmakers belonging to PML-N staged walkout against Speaker’s decision to disallow a resolution recommending the Speaker to issue production order for a PML-N lawmaker who was recently detained by National Accountability Bureau (NAB). They did not return until the adjournment of the sitting. The Rules of Procedure of the Provincial Assembly of Punjab 1997 do not empower the Assembly Speaker to summon an arrested or detained lawmaker to attend the House proceedings.
• A PML-N lawmaker pointed out the lack of quorum at 1325 hours. The quorum was found complete after ringing of bells for five minutes.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on December 14, 2018 (Friday) at 0900 hours.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available on Punjab Assembly’s website.
• 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 regretted.