LAHORE: In a rare occurrence in the parliamentary history, a provincial minister is also occupying the top slot of Public Accounts Committee-II of the Punjab Assembly.

Syed Yawar Abbas Bukhari, PTI lawmaker from PP-1 (Attock), was appointed minister for Baitul Maal and Social Welfare on Dec 21, 2020, while he had already been elected chairman of the Public Accounts Committee-II. He had chaired a sitting of the committee even after his induction into the provincial cabinet instead of relinquishing charge of the panel’s chairmanship.

An assembly through its standing committees holds accountable the government and a cabinet member being accountable to the house can’t hold his own regime accountable.

However, Mr Bukhari says that rules of the business of the Punjab Assembly are silent on whether a minister may retain the chairmanship of a standing committee. Moreover, none has so far asked him to resign as the committee’s chairman, he argues.

The Public Accounts Committee-I is already non-functional due to a deadlock between the government and the opposition, the latter demanding that Opposition Leader Hamza Shehbaz Sharif must be appointed as the PAC-I head as per the tradition set in 2008 in accordance with the Charter of Democracy (CoD). The Punjab government was reluctant to meet the demand though it had accepted Shehbaz Sharif, the opposition leader in the National Assembly, as the chairman of the NA’s Public Accounts Committee.

Meanwhile, PML-N MPA from PP-84 (Khushab) Malik Waris Kallu died of Covid-19 in a private hospital here on Friday.

His funeral prayer was offered at his native village Roda Thal on Nurpur Thal Road in the evening and was laid to rest in the local graveyard.

A resolution for paying tribute to the services of the late Malik Waris, who had been elected to the Punjab Assembly for the fourth consecutive term, for democracy has been submitted with the assembly secretariat by N-League MPA Rabia Faoorqui.

Published in Dawn, March 13th, 2021