Why are only some of our state institutions accountable to the parliament? There is a need for a uniform system.
This was said by Senate Deputy Chairperson Jan Muhammad Jamali Thursday at the launching ceremony of a directory of parliamentary committees and civil society/research organisations, prepared by Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (PILDAT).
He said, “We need more powers for parliamentary committees in line with the Senate committees of United States to monitor all state institutions, which include the military, judiciary and executive.”
In developed countries, he said, the president and the prime minister are treated as common persons and it is time to bring that change in our system. He suggested that every political party should award 33 per cent tickets for women in the next election, to directly involve them in the democratic process.
Balochistan Assembly Speaker Aslam Bhotani took the audience by surprise by saying there is no parliamentary committee in Balochistan assembly as all members, except one, are part of the provincial cabinet.
Punjab Assembly Speaker Rana Muhammad Iqbal said parliamentary committees in his province are very active in the democratic process as both committee heads belong to the major opposition parties.
The Khyber-Pakhtunkhawa (K-P) Assembly speaker said that committees should be given more powers to keep an effective check on the executives. He said that the bad security situation in his province was the primary hurdle in the smooth functioning of the committees in K-P.
Senator Tariq Azeem Khan of PML-Q lamented that the committees have no powers to forcefully implement their recommendations. “The bureaucracy doesn’t even bother to inform us of the status of our recommendations,” he said. He suggested that executives should be asked to implement their recommendations within 90 days or report back to the committee with an explanation.
PILDAT Executive Director Ahmed Mehboob Bilal said that the directory lists information of 28 standing committees of the Senate, 32 standing committees of the National Assembly, 33 standing committees of K-P, 38 standing committees of Punjab and 30 standing committees Sindh, in addition to the profiles of 90 organisations.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 23rd, 2011.
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