The parliament plays a pivotal role in any democracy. The other proverbial pillars perform participatory roles so that the facade of inclusive plurality remains robustly in place. Any functioning parliament is expected to perform three basic functions – representation of the citizens, legislation on important national issues and oversight of the government’s performance.

Data available with public sources about the overall performance of Pakistan’s 15^th National Assembly does not reveal a very encouraging picture. While the government can boast about an increase in legislative activity in the third year of the Assembly, there was an obvious lack of interest on the part of the Leader of the House – Prime Minister Imran Khan – as well as Leader of the Opposition – Shehbaz Sharif – to be part of the Assembly proceedings.

Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency report published at the end of the third year of the 15^th National Assembly in August appreciates the 100 percent rise in legislative work by passing 60 laws. The Assembly had passed 30 bills in its second year and a mere 10 in the first.

Prime Minister Khan attended only seven sittings of the National Assembly, a mere 12 percent in 2021. His record for third year of the Assembly – from August 2020 to August 2021- is a paltry 9 percent. This is the man who made lofty promises during his election campaign to follow the British model of attending the Question Hour every week. Contrary to his claims, his attendance frequency has worsened ever since he came into power. Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) records show that Khan had attended only 16 sittings out of a total of 133 since taking oath on August 8, 2018, till February 17, 2020. He remained absent from 117 sittings.Attendance records for the Opposition leader are dismal too. Shehbaz Sharif came to the House on only 10 occasions – only 13 percent.

Judging its performance during 2021 in terms of a value-for-money benchmark, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that the parliament has performed below par on most counts. Most draft bills presented in the parliament were regarding international commitments, said PILDAT. The urgency and strong-arm tactics that were displayed during pushing 15 bills through the National Assembly were about the IMF and the FATF. The lack of scrutiny and discussion during the passage of the Finance Bill shows paucity of expertise on important financial and economic aspects. Member’s participation in the House activity is limited largely to frontbenchers. But, every member of the National Assembly is costing the national exchequer a whopping Rs 15.82 million a year.

The heightened toxicity of Pakistani politics is making the parliament a mere talking shop – a shop that is least effective on most matters of national import. The government spokespeople, however, continue with the time tested tradition of “sub achcha hey” (all is well).

Dr Shahzad Wasim, the leader of the House in Senate, thinks the parliament performed better in terms of legislation despite the lack of cooperation from the Opposition. He says the parliament faced the challenge of coronavirs but still met regularly. “Joint sittings were held and Prime Minister Imran Khan took the vote of confidence from the parliament. Important laws were passed in those sessions besides proving the majority. Despite the propaganda the allies stood firmly with the government.”

Leading Opposition voices and old parliamentary hands, however, have no mercy for the government.Raza Rabbani, former chairperson of Senate, sounded pretty cross with the way the parliament has behaved during the year. “There was retrogression, ceding of space, butchering of parliamentary traditions, gross violations of the rules, law and the Constitution. All decisions were made outside the parliament. It was not taken into confidence on the terms of the IMF agreement, negotiations with the TTP, agreement with the TLP, the state of economy or the strategic shifts in national security and foreign policy.”

Prime Minister Khan attended only seven sittings of the National Assembly, a mere 12 percent in 2021. His record for third year of the Assembly — from August 2020 to August 2021— is a paltry 9 percent. This is the man who made lofty promises during his election campaign to follow the British model of attending the Question Hour every week.

Talking to The News on Sunday (TNS), Rabbani says: “The manner in which legislation was done over the last joint sitting cast a shadow of shame. Street-smart tricks of supplementary Orders of the Day, to have legislation passed without Standing Committee scrutiny or debate reflect the quality of legislation. The question remains, is there a parliament or is there just a Parliament House?”

In PML-N’s Khurram Dastgir Khan’s opinion the parliament suffered a constant degradation of its norms by the ruling party and sank to new lows in 2021.“On June 15^th, the nation witnessed the sordid spectacle of federal ministers climbing atop desks in the Assembly Hall and hurling heavy budget books at the Leader of the Opposition. Other federal ministers led fellow Treasury members in chanting sleazy slogans against a woman office-bearer of PML-N.”

In terms of deliberation, the high point of the year was the record number of Opposition members who participated in the budget debate. Yet, the Opposition discovered that, at the very minimum, without gathering in front of the Speaker’s dais, chanting slogans, and throwing torn agenda pages in the air, it would not be seen opposing the government.”

Khan says the Opposition’s interest in the House proceedings was episodic. “When it came together in the spring, it inflicted the so-far worst defeat on the government by electing its senator from Islamabad. Yearlong the Chair colluded callously with the Treasury benches and more than once manipulated the count to favour the government. Treasury benches decided that adjournment due to lack of quorum was decidedly a lesser evil than hearing the Opposition criticism on crippling inflation, US withdrawal from Afghanistan, IMF package, and the government’s shambolic mismanagement of economy.”

PPP’s Sherry Rehman says: “Because of this dangerous government’s distaste for parliamentary practices and norms, this last one year has seen terrible reversals of parliament’s capacity to bring change, to solve problems for the people we represent and to create key policies that can safeguard Pakistan from the economic storm we have landed in. After months of gruelling work in Standing Committees we have seen scores of bills being bulldozed without amendments. The presidency has become the ordinance factory to set aside the parliament. Rule by ordinance has rendered parliament a place of acute polarization. Joint sessions have been used to bulldoze bills instead of creating consensus. It has been a black year for Pakistan’s parliament.”

Last word –the D in D-Chowk – where the parliament building is situated – presumably stands for democracy. It was expected that the delegates who dwell in distant districts but drive to Islamabad after their destitute constituents have voted them in so that they can discuss and deliberate people’s dilemmas and difficulties and devise ways to deliver on promises made. For now, hardly any of that is happening.

The writer works for the Jang/Geo Group.   He tweets @aamirghauri