ISLAMABAD, January 18, 2012: The National Assembly during the fifth sitting of the ongoing session met for an hour and 56 minutes on Wednesday. A total of 92 Legislators were present at the start and 70 were present when the sitting was adjourned.

Members raised a total of 21 Points of Order, which consumed 53% of the sitting time. However, none of the Points of Order attracted the Chair’s formal ruling.  The Constitution (Twentieth Amendment) Bill, 2012 was introduced and sent to the respective Standing Committee.

The Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition did not attend the sitting. Only the Parliamentary Leaders of NPP and PPPS were present.

Members’ participation in House proceedings

• The National Assembly met for an hour and 56 minutes.
• The sitting started at 1810 Hours against the scheduled starting time of 1700 hours. The proceedings started late by 65 minutes.
• The Speaker chaired the sitting for 61 minutes, while the remaining time was presided over by a Member of Panel of the Chairpersons.
• The Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition were not present.
• The Parliamentary Leader of NPP and PPPS were present while PMLN, MQM, BNPA, MMPA, ANP and PML reaming absent.
• The Chief Whips of PML, ANP, PMLN, MQM, and PPPP were present, while those of MMAP and PMLF were absent.
• A total of 92 Members (27%) were present at the outset and 70 Members (21%) were present when the sitting was adjourned.
• Seven Members applied for leave to be absent from the sitting.
• Seven out of ten minority Members were present during the sitting.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House took up one out of two Calling Attention Notices (CANs) which appeared on the Orders of the Day.
• Moved by five PMLN Members – three females and two males – the CAN was about “ the failure of the FBR to expand tax net as identified by the Minister for Finance in his Budget Speech, 2011”,
• which was directed to Ministry of  Finance, Revenue, Economic Affairs, Statistics and Planning and Development.
• There was no Question Hour as the prerequisite two weeks have not lapsed between the two sessions.

Output

• The Constitution (Twentieth Amendment) Bill, 2012 was introduced and sent to the respective Standing Committee.
• The National Commission for Women Bill, 2011 was deferred (till tomorrow) by the House.

Order and institutionalization

• Twenty-one Points of Order were raised, consuming 61 minutes (53%) of the sitting time. However, none of the Points of Order attracted the Chair’s formal ruling.
• There were no instances of protests, boycotts or walkouts during the sitting.

Transparency

• Orders of the Day were available to Legislators, observers and others.
• Information on Members’ attendance was unavailable to observers and the public.
• The Quorum was visibly lacking at various stages of the sitting. However, it was not pointed out by any of the Legislators.

The Daily Factsheet is based on direct observation of the Senate proceedings conducted by Center for Peace and Development Initiatives (CPDI), a member organization of FAFEN