(15 days), Khurram Dastgir (14 days), Ahsan Iqbal (13 days), Khawaja Saad Rafiq (13 days) and Khawaja Asif (11 days).
The only punctual minister is Riaz Hussain Pirzada who attended 28 sittings, out of 29. Tallal Chaudhry is an exception among those who frequently appear on TV but is among the punctual MNAs with 28-day’s attendance.
Other noted lawmakers and parliamentary leaders falling in the list of absentees are Makhdoom Amin Faheem, Zafrullah Jamali, Amir Haider Hoti, Dr. Farooq Sattar, Ch. Pervaiz Elahi, Faryal Talpur, Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman, Dr. Fehmida Mirza, Daniyal Aziz and others.
Former commerce minister Makhdoom Amin Faheem skipped the budgetary session altogether whereas he remained on leave for eight days in the following session. Former NA speaker Dr. Fehmida Mirza was on leave for 28 days and one day absent, out of 30 days examined.
Former chief minister KP Amir Haider Hoti remained absent for 27 days. Former chief minister Punjab Ch. Pervaiz Elahi was absent for 23 days. MQM’s parliamentary leader Dr. Farooq Sattar made to this list by staying absent for 22 days. Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman was marked absent for 15 days, Faryal Talpur for 19 days and Daniyal Aziz for 18 days.
Among the most punctual MNAs who didn’t skip even one-day proceedings, are the following 18 names: Col (R) Ghulam Rasool Sahi, Ch. Asad-ur-Rehman, Sheikh Aftab Ahmed, Sardar Mumtaz Ahmed, Waheed Alam Khan, Sardar Amjad Farooq, Sheikh Fayyaz-ud-Din, Aftab Shaban Mirani, Tahira Aurangzeb, Seema Jameeli, Shaheen Shafique, Musarrat Rafique Mahesar, Shahida Akhtar Ali, Naeema Kishwar Khan, Begum Tahira Bokhari, Kiran Haider, Mst. Naseema, and Aliya Kamran.
The National Assembly’s attendance record used to be treated confidential until recently as the assembly secretariat had refused many requests seeking access to it. The record under analysis is peculiar in a sense that it has been made public for the first time and only on the direction of the Presidency.
A couple of RTI requests were rejected and the secretariat didn’t bother to honour the directions of the Federal Ombudsman, the appellant authority against such refusals. The secretariat instead challenged the FO verdict by filing representation before the President of Pakistan who directed for making the record public.