ISLAMABAD, July 18, 2019: The Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) passed two government bills and adopted nine resolutions on Thursday, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its daily Factsheet.
Following are some key observations of the House proceedings during 11th sitting of seventh session:
Members’ Participation
- The Assembly met for two hours and 36 minutes.
- The sitting started at 1448 hours against the scheduled time of 1400 hours.
- The Speaker chaired the sitting for an hour and 42 minutes while the remaining proceedings was presided over by a member of Panel of Chairpersons.
- The Leader of the House did not attend the sitting.
- The Leader of the Opposition attended the entire proceedings.
- As many as 50 members (40%) were present at the start and 48 (39%) at the end of the sitting.
- The parliamentary leaders of ANP, MMAP and PML attended the sitting.
- Two out of three minority members were present.
Output
- The House passed two government bills including the KP Education Monitoring Authority Bill, 2019 and the KP Charities Bill, 2019 which were introduced in the House on April 12 and April 16, 2019 respectively.
- Minister for Law introduced the KP Judicial Academy (Amendment) Bill, 2019 and the KP Civil Servants (Amendment) Bill, 2019 in the House while another private member bill – the Land Acquisition (Amendment) Bill, 2019 – was introduced by an MMAP lawmaker.
- The House adopted five resolutions appearing on orders of the day. One of the resolution expressed condolence on the death of 35 people in Orakzai District and Police Officers in Karachi while other four demanded to set up medical center in Malakand Division, construct Shaheed Farman Ali Khan Medical center in Swat, increase law staff in Pakistani Consulate in Saudi Arabia and widen a road in Peshawar.
- The House also adopted four supplementary resolutions. These resolutions demanded to settle cases of vehicles confiscated by police, improve food and nutrition policy, ensure decent behavior of airport staff with overseas Pakistanis and make laws for protection of animals.
Representation and Responsiveness
- The House took up six out of 16 starred questions. In addition, the lawmakers asked six supplementary questions.
- The lawmakers belonging to MMAP and PPPP withdraw their Adjournment Motions (AMs) after assurance from the concerned minister to resolve the issues highlighted through these motions.
- The Provincial Ministers for Communication and Works and Law responded to two Calling Attention Notices (CANs). These notices urged the government to provide funds for the construction of roads in PK-11 Upper Dir and set up Engineering Campus there.
Order and Institutionalization
- As many as ten lawmakers spoke on Points of Order consuming 15 minutes.
- PML-N and PPPP lawmakers protested during the proceedings for two minutes against alleged misuse of authority by NAB officials.
- The House was adjourned to meet again on July 19, 2019 (Friday) at 1000 hours.
Transparency
- ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and others.
- The attendance of lawmakers was not available to the observers and media.
This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the KP Assembly proceeding conducted by United Rural Development Organization (URDO) – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted