PPP gets chairpersonship of 7 more NA committees

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) on Thursday got the chairpersonship of seven more standing committees of the National Assembly as elections to standing committees continued.

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz got two committees, while the National Party one. A day earlier the PPP managed to get the chairpersonship of five panels.

The standing committees Energy (Petroleum Division), National Food Security & Research, Rules of Procedure & Privileges, Interior, Information & Broadcasting, Aviation, Poverty Alleviation & Social Safety, Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, Narcotics Control and Defence elected their chairpersons unanimously in separate meetings held in the Parliament House on Thursday. The meetings were attended by all the members of respective standing committees and chief whips of the PMLN, PPP and Sunni Ittehad Council.

The elections were conducted by Adviser (legislation) Muhammad Mushtaq, Additional Secretary (committees) Syed Jawad Murtaza Naqvi and Joint Secretary (committees) Syed Haseen Raza Zaidi.

Peoples Partys Fateh Ullah Khan was elected chairperson of the National Assembly Standing Committee of on Defence, Syed Mustafa Mehmood got Energy (Petroleum Division), Syed Hussain Tariq got National Food Security and Research, Nawabzada Iftikhar Ahmad Khan Babar got Aviation, Ghulam Ali Talpur got Poverty Alleviation & Social Safety, Syed Abdul Qadir Gillani got Planning, Development & Special Initiatives and Malik Shah Gorgage was elected as chairperson of Standing Committee on Narcotics Control.

Muhammad Afzal Khokhar of the PMLN got elected as chairperson of the Standing Committee on Rules of Procedure & Privileges, while party’s Raja Khurram Shahzad Nawaz was elected chairperson of the Standing Committee on Interior.

The standing committee on Information and Broadcasting elected Pullain Baloch of the National Party as its chairperson. After the elections, the chairs assumed their seats and hoped that the committees would aptly play their role of parliamentary oversight on the Executive.