KUALA LUMPUR – Budget allocations for 11 ministries were passed at the committee level in the sixth week of the Dewan Rakyat sitting.
It involved the Home Affairs Ministry, Works Ministry, Entrepreneur Development and Cooperatives Ministry, Tourism, Arts and Culture Ministry, Science, Technology and Innovation Ministry, and the Health Ministry.
Other ministries included the Human Resources Ministry, Transport Ministry, International Trade and Industry Ministry, Communications and Digital Ministry, and the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry.
Also passed in this week’s sitting was the motion to set up 10 new parliamentary special select committees for the current term, tabled by Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law and Institutional Reform) Datuk Seri Azalina Othman Said.
It involved the special select committees on finance and economics, health, domestic trade, entrepreneurship, cost of living and agriculture, infrastructure, transport and communications, nation-building, education, and human resource development.
The others were the special select committees on women, children and community, environment, science and plantation, security, international relations and international trade, human rights, elections, and institutional reform.
The special committees will function as the ministries’ check and balance mechanism.
Meanwhile, speaker Datuk Johari Abdul announced that the Dewan Rakyat’s second meeting of the second session of the 15th Parliament, originally scheduled for June 12 to 27, would instead take place from May 22 to June 15.
According to him, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, as the leader of the House, had agreed to the change, in line with Standing Order 11(2) of the Dewan Rakyat Standing Orders.
Johari said this was following his request to the Prime Minister as many members of Parliament would be performing the haj in Mecca this year and need to make appropriate preparations. – Bernama, March 24, 2023
