Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The entire opposition on Friday staged a walkout from the National Assembly in protest against non-issuance of a production order for Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) MNA Khawaja Saad Rafique.

Following the opposition’s walkout, the assembly session was adjourned till Monday.

As the assembly session started, incarcerated Leader of Opposition in NA Shehbaz Sharif, who also attends NA sessions on production orders, pleaded the speaker to issue the same for his detained party member.

Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) lawmaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf also shared concerns over the delay in issuance of production order for Rafique to attend the session. He expressed hopes that the production orders for the former railways minister would be issued soon. To this, NA Speaker Asad Qaiser said he would consult with law experts on the matter.

The opposition had walked out of the assembly on Thursday as well, owing to the very reason.

During the question hour, Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry said a comprehensive plan was being implemented to make Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation and the Pakistan Television Corporation profitable entities. He said a single board of directors had been constituted for both the organizations as part of the reforms. He said both PBC and PTV would be brought under a single administrative umbrella in the next phases in order to bring efficiency and improvement in these organizations. The minister expressed the hope that the PTV would be turned into a profitable entity by next year while the situation of PBC would also be turned around by next two years.

To a question moved by PPP MNA Shahida Rehmani, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan said Radio Pakistan was part of the cultural heritage and all-out efforts were being made to make it a profitable state institution. He said there was no plan at present to lease the building of Radio Pakistan in Islamabad.

Minister for Planning and Development Khusro Bakhtyar told the House that all development schemes were intact in Chitral district, adding that there was no plan of excluding any of these from the Public Sector Development Program for fiscal year 2018-19.

Responding to a calling attention notice, the minister said work on development schemes costing Rs63 billion was in full swing and projects worth Rs32 billion have already been completed. The minister said a development scheme costing Rs16 billion for Shandur had been revised upward to Rs25 billion. He said hydro power project of 106 MW capacity had been completed that would improve the power supply situation in the district. Besides the grid, evacuation projects were also being completed on fast-track basis, he said.

The minister further informed the House that two packages of NHA in Chitral of 117 kms had been completed, while a section of 28 kms was under completion. The calling attention notice was moved by Moulana Abdul Akbar Chitrali and others.

The House was later adjourned to meet again on Monday at 4 pm.

Published in Daily Times, December 15^th 2018.