Accuses Agha Siraj Durraniof violating rules by not conducting voting on motions; says he did itbecausethere were more opposition lawmakers present than treasury members
Karachi
All opposition parties in the Sindh Assembly jointly submitted a censure motion against speaker Agha Siraj Khan Durrani on Friday for his “flagrant violation of rules and regulations” while chairing the sitting of the legislature earlier in the day.
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement, the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf signed censure motion and submitted it to the provincial assembly secretariat. They alleged that the speaker had rushed through the day’s agenda in clear violation of the assembly’s rules.
The assembly’s sitting lasted less than an hour. During the brief proceedings, opposition legislators accused the speaker of violating of rules as he had not properly conducted voting on five motions tabled in the House for consideration.
They maintained that the ruling party was aware that the opposition legislators present in the House during the sitting, especially towards the end of the proceedings, outnumbered the treasury legislators and the motions would be defeated.
When the House was called into order at around 10:30am, there were 22 lawmakers present including 15 treasury MPAs. When the session was abruptly adjourned by the speaker till December 22, there were 25 treasury and 31 opposition legislators in the House. At the outset of the proceedings, PML-F MPA Nusrat Sehar Abbasi pointed out the lack of quorum, but the speaker ignored her point.
The five motions on which the opposition demanded proper voting related to the extension required in the presentation of standing committees’ reports on proposed government bills i.e. the Sindh Mass Transit Authority Bill, 2014 and the Sindh Medical and Dental Council Bill, 2014.
The censure motion read: “We the following members hereby give a notice under the Rule 206 (read with Rule 256) to suspend all relevant rules and move a motion under the Rule 209 for the flagrant violation of Rules and Regulations by the Hon’able Speaker, under the Rule 205 of the Rules of pProcedure of the Provincial Assembly of Sindh. That on this 18th day of December 2015 while the House was in session and items No XI to XVI of the Order of the Day were taken by the Hon’able Speaker, all the members of the Opposition demanded the division of the House under the Rule 220 but the Hon’able Speaker ignored the demand and continued the proceedings without division and despite objection and uproar by the members of the opposition. By such act, the Hon’able Speaker has violated and flouted the Rule 229 (i) (ii) & (iii) and as such this House condemns and censures the conduct of the Hon’able Speaker”.
The Rule No 229 of the rules of procedure defines the procedure in detail for conducting a proper vote count in the House by the speaker on any proposed bill, motion, or resolution if an objection is raised by the lawmakers.
Earlier, the Sindh Minimum Wages Bill, 2015 was introduced in the House, which envisages setting up a minimum wages board for proposing the minimum rates of wages for adult, skilled, juvenile, and adolescent workers employed in industrial and commercial establishments of the province.
Opposition media talk
Later talking to reporters, leaders of the opposition political parties warned that after the censure motion, a no-confidence motion could also be moved in the assembly against the speaker for running the House in complete negation of constitutional and democratic norms.
MQM’s Khawaja Izhar-ul-Hassan, the opposition leader in the assembly, said the speaker had chaired the proceedings on Friday in an arbitrary manner and in violation of the rules and constitutional procedure.
“The speaker while resorting to undemocratic ways totally ignored the repeated demand of the opposition legislators to uphold constitutional means and prescribed rules for conducting the proceedings,” he added.
The MQM MPA said the speaker had violated the oath of his office as he did not consider the lawful demand of the opposition legislators who were present in majority in the House.
Grant to NGOs
Earlier, responding to lawmakers’ queries during the Question Hour of the House, provincial minister Dr Sikandar Mandhro said the provincial government’s Social welfare department did not provide funds to non-governmental organisations on a regular basis but some grant-in-aid was distributed among actively working ones registered with the department.
He added that this grant-in-aid was provided under Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies (Registration and Control) Ordinance-1961 and related Rules-1962.
The criteria for distributing the grant-in-aid to these NGOs include submission of certain documents to the registration authority i.e. annual audit report, performance report, the proceedings of election of their office-bearers, and details of their activities.
The provincial minister also informed the House that there were 17 rehabilitation centres for disabled people in the province. Of them, 12 were for children and five for adults.
Five of these centres are in Karachi and one each in Qasimabad, Hyderabad; Mirpurkhas, Sukkur, Khairpur, Dadu, Badin, Thatta, Sanghar, Shaheed Benazirabad, Larkana, Jacoabad, and Shikarpur.