Day by Day Current Affairs (August 16, 2018) | MCQs for CSS, PMS, NTS

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August 16, 2018

1. Asad Qaiser, Qasim Khan Suri new NA custodians

• PTI candidates for speaker, deputy get 176 and 183 votes against Shah’s 146 and Mehmood’s 144
• Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf with the support of its allies managed to get its men elected as speaker and deputy speaker of the National Assembly with a clear majority.
• A total 330 votes cast in the elections for the speaker of the 15th National Assembly of Pakistan, while eight votes were rejected due to invalidity.
• Qaiser, who stepped in the shoes of outgoing speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, bagged 176 votes. The nominee of ‘grand opposition alliance’ from Pakistan People’s Party, Syed Khursheed Shah secured 146 votes.
• PTI nominee Qasim Khan Suri – who hails from Balochistan – won the contest for the deputy speaker by securing 183 votes out of total 328 cast.

2. Agha Siraj Durani re-elected as SA Speaker

• Agha Siraj Durrani was re-elected August 15, 2018 as the Sindh Assembly speaker after bagging 96 votes from the house as compared to the 59 votes bagged by his competitor Javed Hanif, the joint candidate of opposition parties.
• PPP candidate for deputy speaker, Rehana Leghari, also successfully clinched the post of deputy speaker after securing 98 votes as compared to 59 votes to Rabia Azfar Nizami who was a joint candidate of opposition parties, including PTI, MQM-P and GDA.
• A total of 158 votes out of total 168 were polled during the process while three TLP members who were present in the assembly did not take part in the voting process.

3. Mushtaq Ghani and Mahmood Jan elected as KP speaker and deputy speaker

• Pakistan Tehreek-iInsaf`s Mushtaq Ahmad Ghani and Mahmood Jan were elected speaker and deputy speaker of the new Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly respectively on August 15, 2018.
• They defeated the nominees of the joint opposition.
• Mushtaq Ghani received 81 votes against 27 votes of Laig Mohammad of Awami National Party, out of total 108 polle d votes. Two voters from the opposition went to the speaker in secret ballot. Aziz Gran of the PTI from Swat has yet to take oath of office and so, he didn`t poll his vote.
• Mr Ghani, a senior lawmaker, had served as higher education minister and adviser to the chief minister on information during the last PTI government.
• Hailing from Abbottabad district, he was elected member of the provincial assembly on the ticket of Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid in 2002. He however quit the party afterward and won the 2013 election as an independent candidate and joined the PTI.

4. New Punjab Provincial Aseembly house sworn in

• As many as 354 newly-elected members including those who returned on reserved seats of 17th house of the Punjab Assembly took oath on August 15, 2018.
• Outgoing Speaker Rana Muhammad Iqbal welcomed the MPAs-elect before he administered oath to them. Of the members who were sworn in, 10 arrived late and were administered oath towards the end of the session.
• According to the party position in the house, the PTI is leading with 173 members, PML-N is runner-up with 162, both PML-Q and PPP 10 each, besides three independent members and one of Rah-e-Haq party.

5. Rafiq Rajwana resigns as Punjab governor

• Punjab Governor Rafiq Rajwana on August 15, 2018 resigned from his office and wished to resume his legal practice.
• Mr Rajwana, a lawyer by profession from Multan, made the announcement of his resignation during a surprise visit to the Lahore High Court Bar Association.
• Mr Rajwana held a farewell meeting with the staff of the Governor House, vacated the official residence and shifted to his private home. Mr Rajwana was appointed governor in May 2015.

6. Justice Musarrat becomes first woman to head a poll tribunal

• The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), which already has the first ever woman member from Khyber Pakhtunkha (KP), in another first has appointed a woman judge from the same province as election tribunal.
• In a belated exercise, the ECP appointed on August 15, 2018 20 tribunals comprising serving judges of the high courts to adjudicate election disputes. One of the tribunals comprises Justice Musarrat Hilali. Normally election tribunals are appointed with the issuance of finalnotificationofelectionresults, which is also beginning of the countdown of 45 days given to candidates for filing cases against the results.
• As the notification for election tribunals has been issued late this year, the applicants will have less than 40 days for the purpose.
• Eight tribunals have been appointed for Punjab, five for KP, four for Sindh and three for Balochistan.
• Under the elections act, the law states that an election tribunal has to decide a petition within 120 days of its filing, but at the same time if the decision is delayed, further adjournment sought by a party will be granted only for up to three days and that too on payment of special cost of Rs10,000 per adjournment.

7. Pakistani-born academic becomes Australia`s first Muslim female Senator

• At a time when Australia is caught up in a bitter row over racism, Pakistani-born Mehreen Faruqi became the first female Muslim member to be appointe d to the Australian senate.
• The Greens Party Member Of Parliament for New South Wales was selected to join the Senate on August 15, 2018 to fill a vacant seat.
• Dr Faruqi migrated from Pakistan to Australia in 1992 with her young family. Prior to entering politics she held a distinguished career as an academic and has a doctorate in environmental engineering.
• This is the second milestone for the leader, as her election to the state parliament in 2013 made her the first Muslim woman to attain any political office in Australia.

8. Italian PM declares 12-month emergency in Genoa

• Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte declared August 15, 2018 a 12-month state of emergency in Genoa following the collapse of a motorway bridge that killed at least 39 people.
• A cabinet meeting took place in which we have decreed a 12-month state of emergency and made available a first allocation worth five million euros ($5.7 million) for the national emergencies fund.
• Transport minister Danilo Toninelli and Deputy Prime Ministers Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini announced the move earlier on August 15, 2018.

9. PTI MPA-elect passes away

• A Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf MPA-elect from PP-222 (Jalalpur Pirwala), Malik Ghulam Abbas Khakhi, passed away in Islamabad on August 14, 2018 night after suffering from a cardiac arrest.
• He was 60 and has left behind two widows, three sons and a daughter.
• Khakhi had won the Multan seat with 47,429 votes, defeating PML-N candidate Mehdi Abbas Langah, who received 35,983 votes.
• Mr Khakhi is the second PTI MPA who died before taking oath. Earlier, Tariq Khan Dareshak, who was elected from PP-296 (Rajanpur), died of meningitis on Aug 5. He was 48.

10. Creator of iconic Soviet cartoons Eduard Uspensky dies

• Legendary Soviet children’s writer and creator of the USSR’s most popular cartoon characters Eduard Uspensky died in his home in the Moscow suburbs at the age of 80 late on August 14, 2018.
• Uspensky was most famous for his iconic cartoon characters Gena the Crocodile – a friendly crocodile who works at a zoo and plays the accordion – and Cheburashka, a strange brown-haired creature with large ears. Millions of children in the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc watched the animated adventures of Gena the Crocodile, which first aired in 1969. Cheburashka first made an appearance in the cartoon in 1971.