ISLAMABAD, January 23, 2012: Starting after a delay of three hours, the Sindh Assembly met for an hour and seven minutes on Monday, its 17^th sitting of the ongoing session.

Out of the seven questions listed for the Question Hour, only two were put up and responded to by relevant ministries. Four supplementary questions were asked.

The Adjournment Motion regarding alleged corruption by Assistant Mukhtiarkar, Taluka Khairpur Nathan Shah of Dadu District was not taken on the basis of its admissibility. The discussions between the prime mover, the Chief Minister and the Speaker were held for 23 minutes, after which the Adjournment Motion was withdrawn by the mover.

Fifty-eight Members (35% of the total Membership) were present at the start and 90 (55%) when the sitting was adjourned.

Only the Parliamentary Leader of PPPP attended the sitting.

Following are some key observations of the parliamentary business:

Members’ Participation in House Proceedings

• The Sindh Assembly met for an hour and seven minutes.
• The sitting started at 1300 hours instead of the scheduled starting time of 1000 hours. The proceedings started three hours late.
• The Speaker presided over the sitting.
• The Chief Minister was present for 57 minutes.
• Only the parliamentary leaders of PPPP attended the sitting while those of the PML (forward block), MQM, PMLF, PPPP, ANP, NPP and PML were absent.
• Fifty-eight Members (35% of the total Membership) were present at the start and 90 (55%) when the sitting was adjourned.
• Five minority Members were present during the sitting.

Representation and Responsiveness

• Out of the seven questions listed for the Question Hour, only two were put up and responded to by relevant ministries.
• Four supplementary questions were asked.
• The Adjournment Motion regarding alleged corruption by Assistant Mukhtiarkar, Taluka Khairpur Nathan Shah of Dadu District was not taken on the basis of its admissibility. The discussions between the prime mover, the Chief Minister and the Speaker were held for 23 minutes, after which the Adjournment Motion was withdrawn by the mover.

Output

• The Indus University Bill, 2011 was introduced during the sitting, while the Establishment of the Office of Ombudsman for the Province Of Sindh (Amendment) Bill, 2012 was not taken up by the House.

Order and Institutionalization

• Four Points of Order consumed 15 minutes of the sitting time. However, none of them attracted the formal ruling of the Chair.

• There were no instances of protests, boycotts or walkouts.  

Transparency

• Orders of the Day were available to Legislators, observers and others.
• Information on Members’ attendance was unavailable to observers and the public.

After successfully observing proceedings of the National Assembly, the Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) has started the observation of the provincial assemblies – Sindh, Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan – and the Senate.This daily factsheet is based on FAFEN’s direct observation of the 17th sitting of the 32nd session of the Sindh Assembly. These reports are released on the day the sittings are held to provide media and other interested stakeholders vital statistics about the Assembly proceedings to encourage informed public discourse on its performance.

The Daily Factsheet is based on direct observation of Sindh Assembly proceedings conducted by Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF), a member organization of FAFEN