July 1, 2003	Tuesday	Rabi-us-Sani 30, 1424

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ISLAMABAD, June 30: All the cantonment boards will have a status of Tehsil Council and work under district Nazims, a senior official of National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) told Dawn on Monday.

The official said the NRB had prepared a new draft of Local Government system in cantonments, which would be sent it to the Prime Minister Secretariat for approval.

According to the new draft, all the cantonments will be given the status of Tehsil councils and their boards will be expanded to accommodate all Town Nazims of cantonment areas.

The official said the population in some of the cantonment areas was more than the population of city areas and all the cantonment residents paid taxes equal to the residents of city area. “In this connection, the new draft has a provision to include all cantonment boards in local government fiscal system,” he said.

He said if the residents of cantonment areas paid all taxes then they had a right to have their share in fiscal transfer under devolution plan.

Talking to Dawn the NRB chief, Daniyal Aziz, said all stakeholders had been directed to complete the necessary arrangements for holding polls in cantonments. “The LG polls will be held in all cantonments at any cost,” he said.

All the boards have been directed to make close coordination with the in their respective cities to remove bottlenecks, if come in way of holding LG polls, he added.

He said some three technical committees had been formed to meet the provincial governments to learn how they had managed to establish the local governments in their respective districts.

He said Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali had issued instructions to hold LG polls in all cantonments as soon as possible.