Debate on electricity tariff hike deferred again amid opposition protest
PHOTO: APP/FILE
ISLAMABAD:
The National Assembly on Monday passed three bills amid noisy protests from opposition lawmakers but an adjournment motion for a debate on electricity tariff hike was postponed again despite being on the day’s agenda.
The session began with Speaker Asad Qaiser in the chair. During the Question Hour, the house was informed that the total debt of Pakistan was Rs21,400 billion in 2016-17 which increased to Rs36,900 billion by September 2020.
After the Question Hour, the legislative process began, but the opposition members rose from their seats and started raising slogans. Amid the noisy, Parliamentary Affairs Adviser Dr Babar Awan introduced the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor Authority Bill 2020 and the Public Private Partnership Authority Bill 2020, while Parliamentary Secretary for Finance Zain Qureshi tabled the Pakistan One-Window Bill 2020.
NA speaker bulldozes opposition’s ‘B-Team’
Asad Qaiser did not pay any heed to the opposition’s vapid sloganeering
NA Speaker Asad Qaiser, PHOTO: Anadolu Agency/FILE
ISLAMABAD:
The opposition kept shouting slogans, “
Jago Jago, Speaker Jago!” [wake up, wake up, speaker wake up] exactly when Asad Qaiser was busy bulldozing the opposition’s “B-Team” by passing one bill after another and sarcastically asking them to take the floor and give speeches instead of protesting around his desk.
Commotion had almost no effect on the speaker and he did not pay any heed to the opposition’s vapid sloganeering a day after the deadline given by the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) – an anti-government alliance of the opposition parties formed in last September – to Prime Minister Imran Khan to resign fell flat on its face.