LAHORE: Thirty-nine members of the Punjab Assembly were barred from entering the house when proceedings of its 18th session began after an unusual delay of around three hours here on Thursday.
The session which was to continue for a week, as per agenda issued by the Assembly Secretariat, was prorogued sine die on the very first day after laying two ordinances, introducing a bill for amending the canal and drainage law, and getting extension to the validity period of five ordinances for another 90 days.
Twenty-nine MPAs of the ruling PML-N and 10 belonging to the PTI, who were barred from joining the proceedings, had failed to submit their annual statements of assets with the Election Commission as required under the law.
They included Ijaz Khan, Ahmed Khan Bhachar, Sibtain Khan, Mian Aslam Iqbal, Waheed Asghar Dogar, Jahanzaib Khan Khichi, Majeed Niazi, Raheela Anwar and Naheed Naeem of the PTI.
Those from the PML-N were: Mahar Fayyaz, Waris Kallu, Aami Inayat Shahani, Rana Shoaib, Jafar Hocha, Arif Gill, Naeem Gill, Ilyas Ansari, Mian Tahir, Imtiaz Lali, Abdul Qadeer Alvi, Haider Mehdi (parliamentary secretary), Shabir Ahmed, Mian Marghoob, Khurram Chattha, Jamil Hassan, Malik Ahmed Khan, Iftikhar Chachar, Ali Abbas, Rana Mehmoodul Hassan, Bilal Akbar Bhatti, Sardar Atif Mazari, Ahmed Yar Hunjra, Zishan Gurmani, Alamdar Quraishi, Ishfaq Ahmed, Shoukat Laleka, Islam Aslam and Mahmood Cheema.
PML-N leader cuts a sorry figure
Parliamentary Secretary on Health Khwaja Imran Nazir told the house that he had raided and got sealed many health facilities for failing to comply with the prescribed health standards. He said he conducted the raids being the parliamentary secretary. But, to the astonishment of many none from the treasury or opposition benches took the pains to question authority of Nazir for the raids. Law prescribes the role of a parliamentary secretary as responding to queries of MPAs during the proceedings about his/her relevant department, particularly in the absence of the minister in-charge of the department concerned.
Quick in taking credit for the raids, though not empowered to do so, he was also quick in retreating from his original duties – responding to the MPAs’ queries.
“I’m not a parliamentary secretary on Anti-Corruption (Establishment) but on health,” he told Amjad Ali Javed, who had sought latest information of a corruption case in the purchase of equipment for Kloorkot, Bhakkar, trauma centre as mentioned in a written reply.
“The question was about functioning of the trauma centre and I’ve told you that the health facility has been made functional,” he said, notwithstanding a remark from Speaker Rana Iqbal that Nazir could have checked the information (about the case).
Nazir also did not bother to satisfy Javed while replying to another query regarding unregistered medical laboratories in Jhang district.
The secretary instead of giving details of raids, challans and arrests, unlike in answer to another question, would only say that it was an ongoing process and the healthcare commission authority was working overtime to do the job.
This provided an opportunity to an MPA to comment on the working of the healthcare authority, saying an entity formed in 2011 but could not reply to a question put up before it two years ago in 2013.
Meanwhile, Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Rana Sanaullah told women MPAs that the government had almost finalised the draft bill for bringing salaries and perks of the Punjab Assembly members on a par with that of their colleagues in other elected houses and the only issue remained was getting a green signal from parliamentary leaders of opposition parties.
This hurdle too, he said, was overcome during the business advisory committee meeting where opposition leader Mahmoodur Rashid assented to the proposed bill.
Not satisfied, the women sought an assurance from the chair regarding the minister’s promise.
OATH-TAKING: Jahangir Khanzada of the PML-N and Shoaib Siddiqui of the PTI took oath of their office as MPA immediately after start of the proceedings. The house gave a warm welcome by thumping desks when Khanzada, son of ex-home minister Shuja Khanzada who was killed in a suicide hit a couple of months ago, took the floor to deliver a short statement after taking oath.