ISLAMABAD, October 15, 2012: Starting 41 minutes late, the sixth sitting of ongoing 86^th session met for an hour and three minutes on Monday continued to witness low attendance of Senators. Only four legislators were present at the outset and 21 were there at the adjournment.

The House did not take up the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan Bill 2012, six Resolutions and six Motions under Rule 218 appearing on the Orders of the Day.

The Leader of the House and the Leader of the Opposition attended the entire sitting. However, the parliamentary leaders of NP, ANP, MQM, JUIF, PML, BNPA and PMLF did not attend the sitting.

Following are some key observations of the parliamentary business:

Members’ Participation in House Proceedings

• The Senate met for an hour and three minutes.
• The sitting started at 1641 hours against the scheduled starting time of 1600 hours. The proceedings started late by 41 minutes.
• The Chairman chaired the sitting. The Deputy Speaker did not attend the sitting.
• The Leader of the House and the Leader of the Opposition were present during the entire sitting.
• None of the parliamentary leaders attended the sitting.
• Only four Senators (4% of total Membership) were present at the outset, while 21 (20%) were present when the sitting was adjourned.
• Two Minority Senators were present.
• Nine Senators applied for leave.

Representation and Responsiveness

• Six Motions under Rule 218 appearing on the Orders of the Day were not taken up by the House.
• Six Resolutions appearing on the Agenda were also not taken up by the House.

Output

• The Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan Bill, 2012 was deferred.

Order and Institutionalization

• Two Points of Order were raised which consumed six minutes of sitting time.
• There were no instances of protests, boycotts or walkouts.

Transparency

• Orders of the Day were available to Legislators, observers and others.
• Information on Senators’ attendance was unavailable to observers and the public.
• The Quorum was visibly lacking at various stages of the sitting. However, it was not pointed out by any of the legislators.

The Daily Factsheet is based on direct observation of the Senate proceedings conducted by Centre for Peace and Development Initiatives (CPDI), a member organization of FAFEN