As the 15th National Assembly concluded its fourth parliamentary year, the Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development And Transparency (PILDAT) released analysis of its performance.
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari was the most vocal lawmaker during the fourth year of the current National Assembly before the change in government, with a talk time of one hour and 59 minutes , according to PILDAT.
PML-N leader Shehbaz Sharif came in second and spoke for one hour and 57 minutes, followed by PML-N’s Khawaja Mohammad Asif who spoke for one hour and 27 minutes.
During this period in the House of 342 members, 174 (50.88 per cent MNAs) did not speak for a single minute in the Assembly. Out of these 174 non-vocal MNAs, 149 were male and 25 were women MNAs. 84 of these MNAs (22 per cent of the House) belong to the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), 48 MNAs are of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and 23 are affiliated with the PPP.
PILDAT’s comparative analysis looked at the three years and eight months’ period of the National Assembly under former prime minister Imran Khan and also looks how the PTI tenure under Imran Khan as prime minister was different from the same period in the 14th National Assembly.
Legislative activity witnessed a decrease of 8 per cent in the fourth year of the 15th National Assembly as it passed 55 laws compared to 60 bills passed during the third year of the Assembly. 30 bills were passed during the second year while only 10 bills were passed in the first year.
However, in a comparison of legislation between four years of 15th and 14th National Assembly, the 15th National Assembly has passed 155 bills in the four-year-period while the 14th National Assembly had passed 125 bills in its first four years.
