ISLAMABAD, January 23, 2013: Ten bills were passed during the 29th session of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly which also took up most of the agenda items on the orders of the day, says a Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its report.
The session spread over 15 sittings from 10 December 2012 to 21 Jan 2013 lasted 23 hours and 26 minutes. Each sitting, on average, met for an hour and 57 minutes.*
Apart from six bills seeking amendments in the existing laws, the House passed the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Elimination of Custom of Ghag Bill 2012, the Provincial Services Academy Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bill 2013, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Payment of Wages Bill 2012 and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Medical Transplantation Regulatory Authority Bill 2012.
Sixteen resolutions appearing on the orders of the day were adopted. The House passed two resolutions on the killing of the provincial Senior Minister – the first condemned the suicide attack and the second called for bestowing upon him Nishan-e-Pakistan award. The resolutions adopted by the House included setting up shelter homes for old people, condemning use of unparliamentary language against Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, closure of Lowari Tunnel creating traffic problems, rejecting undemocratic forces, and increasing quota for minority students in the government medical colleges.
In terms of taking up the agenda on the list of business, the House performance was much better. It took up 65 of the 80 items on the orders of the day. However the members’ attendance remained low. During the session on average 35 members present at the start of sitting and 37 at the adjournment.
The Chief Minister and the Leader of the Opposition both attended one sitting each. The Speaker chaired 89% of the session time (11 sittings) while the rest of the session was chaired by the Deputy Speaker and the Panel of Chairpersons.
The parliamentary leader of PPPP attended six sittings while the party heads of PPPS and PML attended five sittings each during the session. The leaders of ANP and PMLN did not attend any sitting.
Two adjournment motions on electricity and gas outages in Peshawar and delay in release of salaries and non-regularization of homeopaths and hakims hired in 2007 were taken up.
Communications, water contamination, teachers’ employment, regularization of doctors, irrigation and delay in presentation of a bill were the subject of seven calling attention notices raised during the session.
Out of 59 questions on the agenda, 48 were responded as 64 supplementary questions were asked. A total of 58 points of order consumed 181 minutes – 12% of the session time. The House witnessed three walkouts consuming 21 minutes of the session.
* FAFEN observer was unable to observe the 6th, 8th and the 15th sittings of the session
