Sindh Governor Imran Ismail has effectively rejected the Local Government Act, 2013, introduced by the PPP to roll back the Musharraf-era local bodies system in the province, sending it back to the assembly to reconsider at least nine points he has raised.
It appears that the legislation designed to amend the provincial LG law, the Local Government (Amendment) Bill, 2021, which was passed by the Sindh Assembly last week, has failed to address the criticism in a satisfactory way. In fact, opposition parties have unanimously condemned it.
As per the seven-page document, it seems that the new law will not completely empower the Karachi mayor, leaving him or her at the mercy of the provincial government, while key municipal functions such as water, solid waste management, building control, etc will not completely be under the elected mayor’s control.
However, the new law intends to replace the district municipal corporations with the town system that was first introduced during the Musharraf era. The system was wrapped up by the Pakistan Peoples Party government around a decade before reviving the KMC and DMCs.
The new bill also takes back health-related functions as well as operations of hospitals and a medical and dental college from the only metropolitan corporation of the province as mentioned in Schedule-II Part-I (5). The Sindh governor has expressed his reservations over nine amendments introduced to the Sindh Local Government Act, 2013.
The objections also include the point that secret ballot would pave the way for horse trading. According to Sindh government, the Election Commission had directed that the amendments in the local body system be made before December 1, therefore, these amendments were made soon.
There can be little argument with the fact that the LG system has failed to respond to the needs of Karachi and the rest of urban Sindh. The major reason for this is that the provincial government has taken over key municipal functions that should be the domain of elected city officials.
Now citizens must run after bureaucrats and administrators to beg for the streets to be swept, or garbage to be lifted. The PPP must listen to the opposition and devise a new local bodies law that truly devolves power to the third tier, with the provincial government playing a supervisory role.
