LAHORE, Sept 25: Good rate of legislation despite tussle between the opposition and the treasury and negligible attendance of house proceedings by the chief minister are the highlights of the monitoring report on nine-month performance of the Punjab Assembly.
The report was launched here on Tuesday by Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). It is based on direct observation of the proceedings done by PATTAN, a FAFEN partner organization.
The ceremony was chaired by Deputy Speaker Rana Mashhood who said the PML-N government was working on introduction of some new rules of procedures of the provincial assembly for its members’ capacity building.
The report said eight sessions were held from September 2011 to May 2012 marked by priority to amend laws after the 18th Amendment, tackling the demand for new provinces, and the legislators raising concerns over health, education and law and order in the province.
About the members’ conduct and “indiscipline”, the report observed in almost every sitting that they were making noise, making running commentaries, using offensive or abusive language, using cell phones, eating/drinking during proceedings and delivering written speeches without the chair’s permission.
The proceedings were also marked by tussles between the government and the opposition during 55 sittings that lasted 158 hours and 20 minutes. The house also witnessed walkouts and use of harsh language.
The chief minister attended only two of the 55 sittings while during the same period Sindh chief minister attended 15 out of 45 sittings, Sarwar Bari, a PATTAN representative, said. The opposition leader was absent from 28 sittings.
Parliamentary leaders of the MMAP, PML, PML-F and PML-Z also attended less than half of sittings.
The attendance of members in general was low, since on an average only 51 MPAs were present at the beginning and 56 at the end of each sitting.
Of the 41 bills passed during the period, 37 were amendments to existing laws to suit the province’s jurisdictional needs after the passage of the 18th Amendment. The four new bills passed were aimed at facilitating private investment in the energy sector, giving ownership rights to tenants, establishing a university in Dera Ghazi Khan, and conserving the Walled City of Lahore.
Introduced separately by the treasury and opposition benches, the house adopted resolutions on new provinces—Janoobi Punjab and Bahawalpur—calling on the centre to set up a commission on creating new provinces on the basis of administrative, historical, constitutional and political grounds.
Out of 64 resolutions, 48 were adopted. One of them called for bringing to justice the killers of Nawab Akbar Bugti and measures to bring Balochistan back into the national mainstream.
Out of the 249 adjournment motions 100 were disposed of, 115 were pending and 27 taken up, explanations were given for six and one was referred to the standing committee.
The provincial government responded fully to 98 per cent of the 1419 questions. Out of the 24 calling attention notices, only one was not taken up.
A reason for low disposal of some agenda may be the excessive use of points of order as 339 points of order consumed 15 per cent of the time. Since the chair did not give a formal ruling on any of these points, they do not count towards any assembly output.