ISLAMABAD, March 5, 2019: The Senate sitting was adjourned on Tuesday amid lack of quorum and opposition’s walkout from the proceedings, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN).
Following are key observations of the House proceedings during fifth sitting of 287th session:
Members’ Participation
- The House met for an hour and 48 minutes.
- The sitting started at the scheduled time of 1500 hours.
- The Chairman presided over the entire sitting.
- The Deputy Chairman was not present.
- The Leader of House attended the sitting for an hour and 35 minutes.
- The Leader of the Opposition was present for an hour and 33 minutes.
- The Prime Minister did not attend the sitting.
- As many as 17 lawmakers (16%) were present at the outset and 18 (17%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
- The parliamentary leaders of PPPP, PML-N, PML-F, PTI, ANP, PkMAP and MQM attended the sitting.
- As many as two out of four minority lawmakers were present.
Output
- On behalf of Chairperson Committee on Rules of Procedure and Privileges, a member of the Committee presented its reports on the Questions of Privilege regarding the misbehavior by a Frontier Constabulary (FC) personnel with a PkMAP lawmaker and the irresponsible attitude and misbehavior of an airhostess with a PML-N lawmaker.
- The House did not consider the legislative business.
Representation and Responsiveness
- The Chair disallowed five Adjournment Motions (AMs) for not fulfilling the admissibility criteria as laid down in the Senate’s Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business 2012 while as many AMs were dropped due to the absence of the movers.
- The House took up 12 out of 52 Starred Questions while two questions were deferred on the government’s request, six lapsed due to the absence of the movers while 32 questions were not considered. The Chair referred of a question to the Senate Standing Committee on Health. The lawmakers also asked 29 supplementary questions.
- As many as eight lawmakers raised Points of Public Importance mostly highlighting the violation of Pakistan’s maritime boundary.
Order and Institutionalization
- The opposition walked out from the proceedings at 1631 hours against the unsatisfactory replies by the Ministries of Defence and Foreign Affairs on Points of Public Importance. They did not return to the House till its adjournment.
- A PPPP lawmaker pointed out the quorum at 1641 hours that led to the ringing of bells for five minutes. The quorum did not complete after the bells and the House was adjourned to meet again on March 6, 2019 (Wednesday) at 1500 hours.
Transparency
- ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and public.
- The attendance of lawmakers is available on the website.
This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Senate proceeding conducted by Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). Errors and omissions are excepted