Save the 45-minute delay in its beginning, the first session of the 16th Punjab Assembly on Sunday saw little hullabaloo, with the oath-taking of all 341 elected members wrapped up smoothly in a span of two hours.
The delay was caused by no accident: the Punjab Assembly speaker from the last tenure, Rana Muhammad Iqbal Khan, is reported to have purposely postponed the session from its scheduled time of 10am to ensure former Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif’s presence at the ceremony’s start.
But as the much-awaited leader did not arrive by 10:45am — owing to a parliamentary meeting he was heading at Alhambra Hall, Lahore — the speaker decided to proceed without him.
Shahbaz Sharif, who has been nominated for the office of Punjab chief minister by his party once again, finally arrived at 11am and left the assembly session in a jiffy after signing the oath register — not lingering for even 10 minutes.
While talking with the media outside the assembly, Shahbaz Sharif said that the public had vested its trust in the PML-N, and he and his party would do its best to fulfill expectations.
Rana Iqbal administered the oath to the elected lawmakers in the House. “I hope you fulfill the expectations of the people who have brought you here,” he said, as members of the House proceeded to sign the oath-taking register.
The Tiger’s home ground
As elections on five seats were postponed, 366 house members were elected instead of 371, according to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).
Out of these 366 elected members, 312 belong to the PML-N, 26 to the PTI, 9 to the PML-Q, 7 to the PPP, 3 to the PML-Zia and one each to JI, BNAP, PNML, and JUI-F. Five lawmakers remained independent.
PML-Q has nominated Chaudhry Moonis Elahi, as its Parliamentary Leader in the Punjab Assembly. Elahi won two provincial assembly seats, PP-110 Gujrat and PP-118 Mandi Bahauddin. He later vacated PP-118. According to law, members who win more than one seat have to vacate seats and keep only one, which will be mentioned in the oath taking register.
Out of these 366 members, only 341 took oath as five were absent and seven women on reserved seats have yet to be selected.
The Punjab Assembly’s calendar
Elections for the speaker and deputy speaker will be held on June 3. On June 5, nomination papers for leader of the house will be submitted, while elections for the leader of the house will be held on June 6. The session was adjourned till Monday, June 3, 10am.
According to the assembly schedule, aspiring speakers and deputy speakers should file their nomination papers in the assembly secretariat by Sunday 5pm. However, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Muslim League Quaid’s (PML-Q) joint opposition decided to submit papers on Saturday.
PTI’s nominated leader of opposition in Punjab Assembly, Mian Mehmoodul Rashid, said his party would give “a tough time to the treasury benches” this time round.
But former Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah seemed hardly intimidated: “The tiny opposition will be no big issue for PML-N in the new assembly.”
Published in The Express Tribune, June 2nd, 2013.