ISLAMABAD, February 22, 2019: The National Assembly could not start debate on the Finance Supplementary (Second Amendment) Bill, 2019 on Friday despite the Chair’s direction, however, the House discussed political issues on Points of Order in violation of the rules, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the proceedings during third sitting of the eighth session:

Members’ Participation

• The Assembly met for an hour and 29 minutes; however, the sitting remained suspended for 15 minutes due to lack of quorum.
• The proceedings started at 1118 hours against the scheduled time of 1100 hours.
• The Deputy Speaker presided over the entire sitting in absence of the Speaker.
• The Leaders of the House and the Opposition were not present.
• Fifty-one lawmakers (15%) were present at the outset and 123 (36%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of GDA, PML, MMA, PPPP and BAP attended the sitting.
• Four out of 10 minority lawmakers were present.

Output  

• The House did not consider the Finance Supplementary (Second Amendment) Bill, 2019 despite the Chair’s directions to initiate debate on it.
• Other agenda items, including discussion on Senate recommendations, Motion under Rule 259 and Motion of Thanks were not taken up.

Order and Institutionalization

• Three lawmakers, including Ministers for Communications and Inter-Provincial Coordination, spoke on Points of Order for 59 minutes that related to the political affairs.
• The opposition lawmakers protested for six minutes during the speech of Minister for Communications, demanding the Chair to allow them to first speak on the political issues. When the Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination took the floor, the opposition lawmakers went near the dais of the Speaker and again started protest during her speech.
• A PPPP lawmaker pointed out the quorum at 1140 hours that led to the counting and suspension of proceedings for 15 minutes.
• Later, the House was adjourned to meet again on February 25, 2019 (Monday) at 1600 hours.

Transparency

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

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the National Assembly’s proceedings, conducted by the Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). Errors and omissions are excepted.