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June
09: The 2nd Parliamentary Year of the 14th National Assembly,
that concluded in May 2015, has received an overall score of
48% in an evaluation of its performance based on a Framework
developed by the Inter-Parliamentary Union-IPU. The performance
of the National Assembly has remained largely stagnant with
a marginal decline of just 1 percentage point from the Average
Score of the 5-year tenure of the 13th National Assembly when
it was scored at 49%. Figure 1 shows score of the 2nd Year of
the 14th National Assembly for various aspects in comparison
with the 5-year tenure of the 13th National Assembly of Pakistan.
Except for the attendance of the Prime Minister in the National
Assembly sittings, 33 during 2nd year compared to only 7 sittings
during the first year, the performance of the National Assembly
has declined on almost all key indicators of assessment. Compare,
however, the Prime Minister’s attendance in 36% of the
sittings with that of the Leader of the Opposition, Syed Khursheed
Shah, MNA, who attended 78% of the total sittings of the National
Assembly during the 2nd year.
During the 2nd year of its tenure, the 14th National Assembly
has only passed 8 Government Bills compared to 11 passed during
the first year, registering a 27% decrease even though the Government
Bills introduced during the 2nd year, 26, compared to 13 during
the first year, saw an increase. The National Assembly's
Legislative Capacity has also declined in the evaluation
scores by 1 percentage point. The Assembly's legislative capacity
has also suffered a significant drop of 75% from the 5-year
average passage of bills in the 13th National Assembly.
Perhaps owing to lack of passage of any Private Member Bill
during the first year of the Assembly, introduction of Private
Members Bills during the second year has also seen a 42% decline
– 25 Private Members Bills were introduced during the
2nd year compared to 43 during the first year. In comparison,
the previous (13th) National Assembly passed, at average, over
3 Private Members’ Bills every year.
The number of days the 14th National Assembly met during the
2nd year has also declined by 12% - 91 sittings in second year
compared to 103 in the first year. During both years, each sitting,
on average has not lasted more than 3 hours.
54% fewer Resolutions were passed during the 2nd Year of the
14th National Assembly compared to the first year - 26 compared
to 56 Resolutions passed during the first year.
The weakest aspect of performance in the 2nd Year of the 14th
National Assembly is evaluated to be Accountability
of the National Assembly, particularly with regards
to the monitoring and review of levels of public confidence.
Under this aspect, the National Assembly has received a low
score of 38%, and has dropped by 3 percentage points from the
5-year average of the 13th National Assembly.
With the National Assembly refusing to publicly share attendance
records of the MNAs, the average peak attendance observed for
all the sittings of the 2nd Year was 145.68 (43% of the total
attendance). As an average of the maximum number of members
present for each sitting, this figure shows a rather weak performance
of the legislators with regards to regularly attending the sessions
of the National Assembly. The Provincial Assembly of the Punjab,
which had earlier taken the lead among all Legislatures by live
webcasting of its proceedings, has once again, taken the required
initiative of making its members attendance available online.
Despite a Provincial Legislature setting the standards in public
access and transparency, the National Assembly continues to
flout the universal standards of openness and transparency in
this regard.
Second year of the National Assembly of Pakistan yet again
passed without the introduction of any reforms for a meaningful
role of MNAs in scrutinizing the Federal Budget – one
of the key responsibilities assigned by the Constitution. The
Assembly, as is the practice, barely went through the motions
of passage of the budget in 13 days, without referring the budget
to the Standing Committees. The days spent in discussion of
budget also declined – 13 from 17 during the first year,
registering a 24% decrease.
In the pre-budget phase, however, the National Assembly Standing
Committees have begun to slowly but gradually make use of a
new instrument of budgetary oversight by reviewing PSDP budgets
of their relevant ministries. A total of 41 meetings were held
by the National Assembly Standing Committees during the 2nd
Parliamentary Year to review the PSDP proposals. Considering
there are 30 Standing Committees of the National Assembly related
to the Ministries, this averages out to 1.4 meetings per Committee.
The National Assembly's Transparency and Accessibility
has registered a decrease of 4 percentage points during its
recently completed year as compared to the 13th Assembly with
a score of 49%. Parliamentary Oversight over the Executive
has also registered a decreased score by 1 percentage point:
it scored at 49% during the 2nd Year whereas in the 13th National
Assembly it scored 50%. The Representativeness of
the National Assemblyhas received the highest
score at 57%. The only area to show no change from the 13th
National Assembly to the 2nd Year of the 14th National Assembly
has been on Effectiveness of the National Assembly's Involvement
in International Policy. This aspect of the National Assembly's
evaluation has received equal scores both during tenures of
the National Assembly i.e. 41%.
The scores were assigned by a PILDAT Evaluation Group that
consisted of a diverse and representative group of current legislators,
former legislators, eminent lawyers and media persons. It comprised
of representatives from the National and Provincial Assemblies
as well as the Senate. The politician group members had diverse
political affiliation; it consisted of 4 members from the PML-N,
3 members from PTI, 3 from PPPP, 2 from PML-Q, 1 from MQM, 1
from PML-F, 1 from JUI-F, 1 from QWP, and 1 Independent elected
official, 4 of whom were women.
The Score Card is based on an international framework developed
by the Inter-Parliamentary Union to assist Parliaments and their
members in assessing how their Parliament performs against widely
accepted criteria for democratic Parliaments. The detailed Score
Card with the scores on each individual sub-parameter can be
found in Table
1: Comparative Score Card on the Performance of the National
Assembly: 2nd Parliamentary Year.
The Evaluation Group consisted of Mir Abdul Quddus
Bizenjo, Acting Speaker, PML-Q, Provincial
Assembly of Balochistan, Kiramat Ullah Khan,
Former Speaker, PPPP, Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,
Mr. Aslam Bhootani, Former Speaker,
PML-Q Provincial Assembly of Balochistan, Mr. Wazir
Jogezai, Former Deputy Speaker, PPPP, National Assembly
of Pakistan, Syed Naveed Qamar Shah,
Member of the National Assembly (MNA), PPPP, National
Assembly of Pakistan, Mr. Shafqat Mahmood,
MNA, PTI, National Assembly of Pakistan, Senator
Mohsin Leghari, Senate of Pakistan, IND, Ms.
Nabila Hakim Ali, Member of Provincial Assembly (MPA),
PTI, Provincial Assembly of the Punjab, Dr. Murad Rass,
MPA, PTI, Provincial Assembly of the Punjab,
Mr. Qazi Adnan Fareed, MPA, PML-N, Provincial Assembly
of the Punjab, Engr. Qamar Islam Raja, MPA,
PML-N, Provincial Assembly of the Punjab, Mr. Faisal
Sabzwari, MPA, MQM, Provincial Assembly
of Sindh, Ms. Mahtab Akbar Rashidi, MPA, PML-F,
Provincial Assembly of Sindh, Ms. Raheela Durrani,
MPA, PML-N, Provincial Assembly of Balochistan,
Ms. Anisa Zeb Tahirkheli, MPA, QWP,
Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Mr. Muhammad
Asmatullah, MPA, JUI-F, Provincial Assembly of Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa, Mr. Wajih Uz Zaman Khan, MPA,
PML-N, Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Mr.
Shahid Hamid, Former Governor of the Punjab,
Mr. Salman Akram Raja, Lawyer, Supreme Court of Pakistan,
Mr. Hamid Mir, Anchor, Geo TV, Mr. Saleem Safi,
Anchor, Geo TV, Mr. Farrukh
Khan Pitafi, Anchor, PTV World,
Mr. Khawar Ghumman, Parliamentary Correspondent, Dawn
News, Mr. Ahmed Bilal Mehboob, President, PILDAT,
and Ms. Aasiya Riaz, Joint Director,
PILDAT. |
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