PESHAWAR: The opposition walked out of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Friday after Deputy Speaker Prof Meher Taj Roghani bulldozed their call for voting on an amendment to a law.

Accusing Prof Meher, who was in the chair, of acting in a partisan way to save the government from embarrassment, the opposition members shouted slogans against her and staged a walkout causing a lack of quorum, which led to the sitting’s adjournment.

Disturbance began in the house over an amendment proposed by PPP’s Fakhar Azam Wazir to the KP Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2018.

Dy speaker bulldozes its demand for voting on proposed amendment to PPRA law

The bill was tabled by provincial finance minister Muzaffar Said.

In the proposed law amendment, Mr Wazir said a specific time should be given for decision with the two tier grievances redressal mechanism already mentioned in the law.

The original bill says, “unless and until the two tier grievance redressal mechanism, provided in sub-section (1), is exhausted, no court or any other authority shall take cognizance of the same and grant any injunction.”

According to the law, first of the two-tier redressal mechanism is to file a complaint in writing to the head of procuring entity in accordance with prescribed procedure while the second is to file an appeal to the KP public procurement authority against the decision of the procuring entity within fifteen days.

Fakhar Azam wondered how long the complainant would wait for the decision of the two-tier grievance redressal mechanism.

He asked what would be the effectiveness of a complaint if the authority concerned withheld it for a long time.

“It was unconstitutional to deprive someone from approaching the court for justice against any illegality,” he said.

The mover pushed the chair for putting his law amendment to vote when finance minister Muzafar Said opposed him.

Other opposition members stood up in the house demanding voting on the amendment knowing they would defeat the treasury as their 20 members were in attendance against the treasury’s 18.

With all opposition members shouting slogans, the finance minister in a bid to prevent the government from the imminent embarrassment asked the chair to refer the matter to the relevant standing committee of the house for deliberation.

She referred the matter to the standing committee without the approval of the house resulting uproar in the assembly as every opposition member was shouting ‘no’ ‘no’.

Amid protest, the opposition walked out of the house.

Fakhar Azam while leaving the house along other protesting MPAs pointed out a lack of quorum prompting the chair to adjourn the session until Monday.

A senior official of the assembly secretariat told Dawn that under the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly Procedure and Conduct Business Rules, 1988, no matter could be referred to the standing committee without the house’s approval.

Regarding the issue in question, he said it was the decision of the chair and not of the house, which was taken in violation of the rules.

The official insisted that the chair bulldozed the decision of the majority of those attending the session.

Published in Dawn, February 24th, 2018