ISLAMABAD, January 8, 2020: The Senate approved the legislation on the appointment and extension of armed forces’ chiefs and the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, observes Free and Fair Election Network in its Daily Factsheet on Wednesday.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during sixth sitting of the 295^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for 22 minutes.
• The sitting started at the scheduled time of 1500 hours.
• The Chairman presided over the entire sitting.
• The Deputy Chairman was not present.
• The Leaders of the House and the Opposition attended the entire sitting.
• The Prime Minister did not attend the sitting.
• As many as 41 lawmakers (39%) were present at the outset and 79 (76%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of all political parties except JI and JUI-F attended the sitting.
• As many as three out of four minority lawmakers were present.

 Output 

• Chairman Standing Committee on Defence presented the reports of the committee on the Pakistan Army (Amendment) Bill, 2020; Pakistan Air Force (Amendment) Bill, 2020 and Pakistan Navy (Amendment) Bill, 2020. These bills were referred to the committee on January 7, 2020 after their introduction in the House.
• Moved by the Minister for Defence, the House waived off the requirement of giving the members two days to read the committee reports on the above-mentioned bills and immediately proceeded to the clause-by-clause consideration and subsequently to the passage of these bills. The bills were passed as reported by the standing committee.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House did not observe the Question Hour. Instead, it dispensed with the requirement of holding question hour on the Leader of the House’s motion.

Order and Institutionalization

• Chairman informed the House that his ruling to suspend a bureaucrat who misbehaved with a lawmaker had been implemented.
• Lawmakers belonging to JI, JUI-F, NP and PkMAP protested against the passage of the bill.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on January 10, 2020 (Friday) at 1030 hours.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and public.
• The attendance of lawmakers is available on the website.

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Senate proceeding conducted by Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). Errors and omissions are excepted