Nusrat Sehar Abbasi has the most questions

PML-F MPA moved 1,334 questions but only 585 were allowed in the house

KARACHI: Pakistan Muslim League-Functional MPA Nusrat Sehar Abbasi is the most curious lawmaker in Sindh Assembly as she moved 1,334 questions, of which only 585 were allowed in the House.

According to a Sindh Assembly progress report based on the last three years, Abbasi was closely followed by Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s Heer Ismail Soho, who moved 1,037 questions but only 394 were allowed in the House.

The remaining lawmakers were far behind with Pakistan Peoples Party’s Khairunnisa Mughal moving 162 questions, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s Khurram Sher Zaman moving 147 questions, opposition leader Khawaja Izharul Hasan moving 40 questions, two privilege motions and 19 resolutions. The report also noted that a majority of lawmakers did not move a single resolution or asked questions.

These statistics were shared by Sindh Assembly speaker Agha Siraj Durrani in his chamber on Monday. In the last three years, Sindh Assembly passed 118 laws, and adopted 106 government bills and 12 private bills moved by MPAs belonging to different parliamentary parties. The report also revealed that 37 government bills were passed in first parliamentary years that started May 2013. Forty-four bills in the second year and 25 bills in the third year that ended on May 28.



A total of 453 resolutions were received by the assembly in the last three years but it adopted only 57 of them. Two of the resolutions were referred to standing committees and 394 lapsed. Apart from this, the assembly received 144 out-of-turn resolutions and all were adopted. A total of 5,348 questions were received in the last three years out of which 1,847 questions were allowed and 879 were laid on the floor of the House.

Referring to the call-attention notices that were tabled to bring important issues into ministers’ notice, the progress report said that a total of 488 call-attention notices were moved in the House and 334 were allowed. Members belonging to various political parties moved around 269 adjournment motions requesting the speaker to adjourn the routine proceedings and discuss matters of public importance but only four adjournment motions were admitted and discussed. Meanwhile, 223 adjournment motions were disposed of or lapsed and six were withdrawn.

According to the report, 88 privilege motions were submitted by MPAs and 13 of them were referred to the privilege committee. The rest were either ruled out-of-order or lapsed.

When the assembly is not in session, the governor promulgates the ordinance for any law.

Later, the assembly has to the ratify it. On such ordinances, the report said that 24 ordinances were tabled in the provincial assembly and only 16 were laid before the House while eight lapsed.

Later, Durrani spoke to the media and said Sindh Assembly has taken the lead in legislations in Pakistan and equal credit to goes to the opposition parties.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 7^th, 2016.