Only one-thirds of MNAs (current membership of 340) participated in the 44th session of the 13th National Assembly which met for 13 hours and five minutes for six sittings, said Free and Fair Election Network in its preliminary report on direct observation of the National Assembly.
The participation of members remained low throughout the session. Only 32% of members – 87 male and 21 female – took part in the session by either submitting agenda items on the orders of the day or by taking part in the debate.
The House passed three treasury-backed bills, the Special Economic Zones Bill 2012, the Contempt of Court Bill 2012 and the Medical and Dental Council (Amendment) Bill 2012.
The Contempt of Court Bill 2012 was introduced in the 2nd sitting and then subsequently passed in only an hour and eight minutes. The 13-article bill, which exempts public office holders from the contempt of the apex court, was passed with a simple majority present in the House. A total of 150 MNAs – 122 from treasury and 22 from the opposition – were present during the passage of the bill. The opposition party, PML-N, along with some other opposition members, protested against the bill’s passage.
A total of 58 points of orders consumed 29% of the total session time – 225 of 785 minutes. None of the points of orders attracted the chair’s formal ruling. Without the chair’s formal ruling, these points of orders do not lead to any output.
Since the National Assembly Secretariat does not make the attendance record public, FAFEN conducts a headcount of members at the beginning and end of each sitting and documents the actual time spent on the floor of the House by speaker, deputy speaker, prime minister and the leader of the opposition.
While the participation of members was low, the attendance was relatively better than the previous sessions. On average 75 members were present at the beginning of each sitting and 71 at the end.
The new prime minister attended three sittings for 232 minutes (30%) and the leader of the opposition did not attend any of the sittings. The Speaker chaired the proceedings for 25% of the session time; the deputy speaker 57%; and the remaining 12% of time was presided over by members of the panel of chairpersons.
FAFEN is a network of 42 civil society organisations working to foster democratic accountabilities in Pakistan. It is governed by Trust for Democratic Education and Accountability.