Performance review: ‘Women lawmakers lack interest in legislative process’

Most female treasury legislators prefer to submit questions rather than partake in actual legislation

LAHORE: PML-N’s legislator Hina Pervez Butt said most women legislators were not provided legal assistance to bring bills for legislation. She added that is the reason the majority of them take no interest in legislative process.

In the past four years, only 28 bills were submitted by women lawmakers in the Punjab Assembly out of which 10 were submitted by the opposition benches. These bills were submitted from the 2013 to October 2017.

Most women legislators of the treasury benches preferred to submit questions relating to different issues of the departments concerned, resolutions and adjournment motions. As a result, they avoided participation in the legislative process such as the introducing bills relating to different issues.

Hina Pervez Butt of the treasury benches and Dr Nausheen Hamid of the opposition seemed active as they introduced 15 and five bills, respectively, seeking legislation over different issues.

At the same time, the five other bills were submitted by women legislators Sadia Sohail Rana, Faiza Ahmed Malik of Pakistan Peoples Party (Parliamentarian) and Shunila Ruth. The rest of three bills were submitted by PML-N legislators Rahila Khadim, Faiza Mushtaq and Tamkeen Akhtar Niazi.

Punjab Criminal Law (Protection of Minorities) Bill 2017 was submitted by Hina Pervez Butt in which she suggested that anyone forcing people to convert to another religion should face life imprisonment.

She had also submitted a draft of the Punjab Prohibition of Hate Speech Bill, 2017 endorsing effective implementation of various laws against hate speech through the provincial government in line with the National Action Plan against publication of material that propagates hatred, decapitation, extremism, sectarianism and intolerance.

Dr Nausheen Hamid had submitted the Punjab Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill, 2017 for protecting the rights of transgender persons. She suggested in the proposed bill a jail term up to two years or a fine of Rs100,000 or both for anyone who endangers or threatens a transgender.

There are total 75 women legislators of both treasury and opposition benches in the Punjab Assembly. Only 10 women legislators belong to the opposition benches. Out of ten six are of PTI, two of PML-Q, one PPP and one from PML-Zia.

Amendment bills

The women legislators of both treasury and opposition benches also introduced 18 amendment bills. Five were submitted by only Naseem Chaudhry of the PML-N and three by the Shunila Ruth of the PTI.

Resolutions

A tough competition among the women legislators was witnessed in submission of the resolutions in Punjab Assembly on different issues. As many as 959 resolutions were submitted out of which 163 were submitted by PML-N’s Nighat Shaikh while 155 by the PML-N’s Hina Pervez Butt.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 4^th, 2017.