Sindh Assembly Passes Civil Servants (Amendment) Bill, 2017

ISLAMABAD, November 2, 2017: The Sindh Assembly, on Thursday, passed the Sindh Civil Servants (Amendment) Bill, 2017 and discussed an Adjournment Motion regarding results of Population and Housing Census, 2017, says Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during second sitting of the 36th session:

Members’ Participation

  • The Sindh Assembly met for three hours and 42 minutes.
  • The sitting started at 1133 hours against the scheduled time of 1000 hours.
  • The proceedings were suspended for three minutes due to prayers’ call.
  • The Deputy Speaker presided over the entire sitting as the Speaker was not present.
  • The Leader of the House (Chief Minister) attended the proceedings for an hour and 40 minutes.
  • The Leader of the Opposition was present for 58 minutes.
  • As many as 32 (19%) lawmakers were present at the outset and 52 (32%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
  • The parliamentary leaders of MQM and PTI attended the sitting.
  • Five minority members were also present.
  • One member applied for leave.

Output

  • Introduced by Minister for Law, the House passed the Sindh Civil Servants (Amendment) Bill, 2017.

 Representation and Responsiveness

  • The House took up four out of five Starred Questions. The lawmakers raised 25 supplementary questions.
  • A Privilege Motion against official of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board was withdrawn by the mover.
  • The House held discussion on an Adjournment Motion (AM) regarding results of Population and Housing Census, 2017. Eleven lawmakers spoke on the subject of motion consuming an hour and 40 minutes. Another AM regarding stabbing incident in Karachi was rejected with majority votes.
  • The House took up five Calling Attention Notices on governance related issues.

Order and Institutionalization

  • The lawmakers spoke on two Points of Order consuming ten minutes of the proceedings.

Transparency

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

This Daily Factsheet is based on direct observation of the Sindh Assembly proceedings conducted by Pakistan Press Foundation, a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted.