The National Assembly has rejected reports that its official YouTube channel was shut down, saying the disruption was caused by a temporary technical fault rather than any deliberate move to halt coverage of parliamentary proceedings.
The clarification comes a few days after the lower house’s YouTube channel appeared to be inaccessible, with live streams of proceedings not visible on the platform.
In a statement released on social media late Friday, a spokesperson for the lower house said the channel had “not been shut down at any point”.
Instead, a “social media server outage” briefly affected access to the NA’s YouTube channel, he added, noting the glitch was removed later in the day, after which the channel “became fully operational” again.
The spokesperson also pointed out that recordings of the recent joint session of parliament, including members’ speeches, have now been uploaded and are available for the general public to view.
It should be mentioned here that parliamentary sessions had previously been broadcast live through the channel as part of efforts to make proceedings more accessible to the public.
The absence of coverage also coincided with a period in which NA’s proceedings were not aired on state television, prompting questions from opposition lawmakers.
Reacting to the suspension of the telecast, some opposition members also alleged the government was seeking to limit public access to parliamentary debates. However, the lower house officials maintained throughout that the issue was technical in nature.
The issue gained attention as a joint session of parliament was summoned on Friday by President Asif Ali Zardari, which passed three bills that had been returned by the president without signature, according to a statement by the Presidency.
The joint sitting later passed three bills, which included the National Commission for Human Rights Amendment Bill, 2025; the Daanish Schools Authority Bill, 2025; and the Domestic Violence (Prevention and Protection) Bill, 2025.
President Zardari had returned the bills last month despite their passage by the Senate and the National Assembly.
