NA session to continue till completion of tenure next month

ISLAMABAD: The Business Advisory Committee of the National Assembly (NA), which met with the Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf in the chair, decided to continue session of the House which began on Thursday till completion of Assembly’s tenure next month.

“Thanks to Almighty Allah that the 15th National Assembly is going to complete its five year tenure in constitutional way,” the Speaker while addressing the meeting said.

The Business Advisory Committee also decided to execute important legislative business also including passage of private members bills. The parliamentarian would deliver farewell speeches while members and Assembly staff with best performance would also be awarded shields.

In a significant development the House also passed the Pakistan Civil Aviation Bill, 2022 and the Pakistan Airports Authority Bill, 2022. Minister for Aviation Khawaja Saad Rafique said, the bills as aimed restructuring the national flag carrier and ensuring compliance with the international standards.

Maulana Abdul Akbar Chitrali of Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) while raising objections said that the employees of Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) have serious concerns over the legislation, saying that a part of authority would be privatised and they would rendered jobless.

He said that the bills were required to be passed to meet international aviation standards, saying that outsourcing airports did not mean privatisation.

The government also introduced the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2023 and seven other bills in the House. Minister for Information Marriyum Aurangzeb moved all the bills. The minister said that Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) (Amendment) Bill, 2023 would for the first time envisage amendments in nine sections of Pemra Ordinance, 2002 while five more amendments have been added. She said the content of children, energy and economic issues have been added in the transmissions while the law would also provide that the government would stop giving advertisements to a channel if salaries of employees are not paid for two months. She said that all the representative bodies of owners and employees of Pakistan Broadcasters Association (PBA), CPNE and PFUJ, who were part of the joint action committee, have given their inputs in the bill.

She said that as per law, Pemra chairman would not have sole powers to suspend a channel or stop programme of any particular anchorperson and the same decision would be taken by a three-member committee on receiving any complaint.

Interestingly, the farewell session started with a delay of over two hours and later Maghrib break was also extended to over an hour.

Muhammad Aslam Bhootani, an independent member from Lasbela, Balochistan said he was never in the good books of establishment but he got highest number of votes by any candidate from the province. “I always tried to raise voice for problems of my constituency and the province,” he said.