Attendance in Senate sessions in 2012: Raja follows in his predecessor's footsteps

The sun of 2012 set with no worthy improvement in presence of prime minister in Senate. The tradition of former prime minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani regarding attendance in upper house of parliament was adhered to by his successor Raja Pervez Ashraf.
Gilani, during his stint as prime minister before he was shown the door by Supreme Court in a contempt of court case, attended only two sittings, while the incumbent premier Raja Pervez Asharf has so far graced the Senate only once. Chairman Senate Nayyar Hussain Bukhari, who is thought to be man of principles, has also miserably failed in addressing the grievances of the lawmakers as they have been complaining since long that prime minister gives less importance to upper house of parliament.
In 2008-9, the then prime minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani was the first ever prime minister in the parliamentary history of the country, whose attendance in National Assembly remained 95 percent. But he did not feel it of much importance to attend even a single sitting of Senate in 2008-9. However, he took out some time from his busy schedule to attend two sittings in 2009-10 and six in 2010-11. The performance of Senate in 2012 saw improvement in some areas like working days, legislation, privilege motions while it failed to improve in areas such as working hours, private members bills, resolutions and calling attention notices.
The number of actual working days in the forth years showed an increase (62 in 2008-9, 70 in 2009-10 and 84 in 2010-2011) while the number of working days registered an increase in the fourth parliamentary years (91 in 2012), which will be completed in February 2013. The House was marked with low attendance during most of the sessions in 2012, leaving most of the agenda items on the order of the day unaddressed. Each sitting started with an average delay of 45 minutes.
The absence of ministers during question-hour remained a major problem for the senators. They got irritated and sometimes staged walkouts or protested on the floor of the house, but all in vain. The issue is yet to be resolved despite interference of Senate chairman, who has personally taken up the issue when leader of the house Senator Jehangir Bader seemed helpless before the powers commanded by a cabinet member.
The house, which will complete its parliamentary year in February 2013, also witnessed a sharp decline in the number of Senators participating in budget debate. The dwindling number of participants may be indicative of the waning interest of the members in the budget debate.