The Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (PILDAT) has released a report which ranks the performance of federal ministers in the first parliamentary year as the end of first year of coalition government is drawing to a close.
The report marks the end of the first year of the 16th National Assembly on February 28, 2025. It evaluated the performance of the cabinet which consists of 18 federal ministers and two ministers of state.
The report ranks Law Minister Azam Nazir Tarar as the most effective cabinet member because of his performance. The reason behind his top ranking is also explained by the report, which is his high attendance and speaking the most on the floor of the house. The law minister attended 89 out of 157 parliamentary meetings, which is the highest among his cohorts and spoke for a total of 17 hours and 18 minutes during the assembly sessions.
Moreover, he was involved in passing 38 government bills, including constitutional amendments that were passed by the parliament in the year 2024.
The second in line is Defence Minister Khawaja Asif. His parliamentary participation included attending 69 sessions and speaking for 5 hours and 41 minutes.
Another notable ranking was of Minister for Information and Broadcasting Attaullah Tarar who was placed fifth in terms of attendance and third in the list of speaking time which is 4 hours and 29 minutes.
On the other hand, Minister for Economic Affairs Ahad Cheema is ranked the lowest in parliamentary performance. He attended only nine out of 157 sessions and is also ranked 17th in attendance and 19th in speaking time because he barely spoke for a minute in Parliament.
Muhammad Aurangzeb, the Minister of Finance is ranked 12th in attendance, while Aleem Khan, the minister of Privatization was placed eighth in attendance and 13th in the list of speaking time. Ahsan Iqbal, another important minister in the cabinet, is ranked 14th in attendance and 12th in speaking engagement.
Some lesser-known Ministers were also ranked by the PILDAT which include Ali Pervaiz Malik, who stood fourth in attendance and ninth in speaking list while Amir Muqam is ranked sixth in attendance and tenth in speaking.
Chaudhary Salik Hussain is placed 15th in attendance, whereas Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui of MQM serving as the Federal Minister of Education is ranked seventh in attendance and 17th in speaking time.
Jam Kamal Khan, the Minister of Commerce stood ninth in attendance and 12th in speaking while former finance minister and now Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar is ranked 13th in attendance but fifth in speaking time.
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However, it merits mention that there is only one female minister of state, Shaza Fatima Khawaja, who is ranked seventh as per attendance and 14th in the speaking time list.
The report noted that there is no non-Muslim member as part of the cabinet.
