Marked by low attendance of lawmakers, the Provincial Assembly of Sindh passed seven bills, including an important legislative proposal to protect children from underage labour and corporal punishments and adopted 12 resolutions during 12 sittings of the reporting session.
The opposition benches tried to raise the issues of governance and law and order on the floor of the House while the government's less attention towards the agenda sponsored by opposition parties remain the highlights of the session, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) while compiling the 29th session report of the Sindh Assembly.
The reporting session was summoned on January 18 and prorogued on February 2, 2017. It was marked by low interest of lawmakers as on average the maximum number of 67 (40 percent) lawmakers attended each sitting. In addition, 28 (17 percent) members were observed to be present on average at the outset and 47 (28 percent) at the adjournment of sitting. On average, four minority members attended the session.
Each sitting on average started 55 minutes late and lasted three hours and 11 minutes. The eighth sitting of five hours and 25 minutes was the longest one while the 11th sitting was the shortest one, which met for two hours and three minutes. Additionally, a total of 30 minutes prayer break (one percent of the total session time) was observed during the session.
The Speaker remained absent during the entire session as he was performing the duties of Acting Governor of Sindh. The Deputy Speaker attended the entire sittings and presided over the proceedings for 10 hours and 34 minutes (91 percent) while the remaining (eight percent) proceedings were chaired by a Member of the Panel of Chairpersons.
The Leader of the House (Chief Minister) attended seven sittings and remained present in the House for nine hours and one minute (24 percent of the session time) while the Leader of the Opposition attended 10 sittings and attended the proceedings for nine hours and 43 minutes (25 percent of the total proceeding time).
The Parliamentary leaders of PPPP and PTI attended all the 12 sittings while the MQM leader attended 11 sittings, followed by leaders of PML-F and PML-N five sittings each.
Ten bills appeared on the agenda during the entire session, while the assembly gave approval to seven bills, including five government and two private members' bills. The treasury lawmakers tabled more legislative proposals than their opposition counterparts. Party-wise details of the legislative business indicated eight bills were tabled by PPPP lawmakers while one each by PML-F and MQM lawmakers. The passed legislative proposals included the Sindh Prohibition of Employment of Children Bill, 2017, the Sindh Payment of Wages Bill, 2015, the Etihad University Bill, 2017, the Sindh Prohibition of Corporal Punishment Bill, 2015, the Code of Criminal Procedure (Sindh Amendment) Bill, 2017, the Sindh Arms (Amendment) Bill, 2017 and the Provincial Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill, 2015.
The House also referred two amendment bills - the Sindh Zakat and Ushr (Amendment) Bill, 2016 and the Societies Registration (Sindh Amendment) Bill, 2015 -to relevant standing committees for further deliberations. In addition, the Chair rejected a motion jointly moved by the MQM lawmakers to introduce the Malir Development Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2016 during the fifth sitting.
The House adopted as many as 12 resolutions on various matters during the reporting period. Lawmakers belonging to MQM tabled five resolutions individually, followed by PML-N and PTI (two each), PPPP and PML-F (one each) while one resolution was jointly tabled by a PML-F and PPPP lawmaker.
The adopted resolutions were related to launching of the awareness campaigns for registration of women in the forthcoming census, paying homage to GM Syed and Fazil Rahu for their political struggle, controlling illegal manufacture, etc.