14 July 2004	Wednesday	25 Jamadi-ul-Awwal 1425

KARACHI, July 13: The federal government and President Gen Pervez Musharraf were strongly criticized on Tuesday for implanting a system of governance, which had accentuated tension between various tiers of the government and made the centre's writ more dubious.

This was the consensus of the participants of a seminar on 'Three Years of the Local Government System,' organized by the Action Aid, Pakistan, at a hotel. While the participants were critical of the government, contradictions within the local government system also surfaced, as some of the participating councillors criticized the role of nazims and naib nazims.

Speaking at the seminar, Syed Zafar Ali Shah, former MNA, calling the system "districtization," said that it had increased tension between the centre and the provinces, on the one had, and between the provinces and the districts on the other.

He was of the view that owing to this multi-sided conflict, Sindh in particular had been turned into a battle field, as the government was allegedly not prepared to tolerate the opposition and give rights to the people.

Mr Shah, who complained of corruption and abuse of power by the rulers, said the general perception was that present local government system was creating acrimony among the people and was giving rise to alienation and pessimism, which was taking the form of extremism.

"It is not democracy. It is a facade of democracy," he said, adding that the Parliament was only being used as a shield by the regime to ward off its criticism for bad governance.

Pointing out flaws in the present local government system, Mr Shah suggested that in order to make devolution meaningful and effective, the centre should have only four or five subjects and all other subjects should be devolved to the provinces.

Similarly, the subjects concerning the local governments should be completely devolved to it. He suggested that the departments of Police, Revenue, Education, Agriculture and Forests should be returned to the provinces from the present district governments.

He demanded that the Election Commission should be made truly independent, and free, fair and impartial elections should be ensured. Syed Zafar Ali Shah alleged that the present system was not responsive to the people's aspirations and complained of discriminatory approach of the ruling party and the bureaucracy towards those who were not toeing their line.

He said that although it was claimed that the system had devolved the process of decision making to the grassroots level, the truth was to the contrary. He demanded that development schemes should be made and approved strictly on the basis of population and cost, and the local government commission should be headed by the leader of the opposition in the concerned provincial assembly.

He also suggested that only those development schemes should be approved and funded, which had been passed by the union councils of the area concerned. Mr Shah proposed that the Local Government Ordinance and the Police Order, 2002, should be presented in the Parliament for debate.

He suggested that direct elections for district nazims should be allowed after ensuring establishment of an independent election commission. He was also of the view that deputy commissionerate system should be revived.

Opposition leader in the Balochistan Assembly, Mr Kachkol Ali, was critical of the government policies and alleged that right from the beginning the real rulers in the country had been the army generals, and the people had never been given the power to intervene in their affairs. It was contrary to the idea of 'enlightened moderation,' he added.

He said the dictators had always divided the people in the name of religion and democracy and alleged that the centre had always protected the interests of the Punjab alone.

He was of the view that powers and responsibilities of the government had been enshrined in the Constitution, in which there was no reference to the local governments. The system had been protected only in the Sixth Schedule by Gen Pervez Musharraf.

Mr Ali was of the view that the system was devised to cater to the needs of the Punjab, which had manipulated the rules and exploited the population factor, besides its weightage in the military.

He alleged that because of such manipulations and denial of rights and share in the country's resources East Pakistan was forced out. He said that decentralization of power from the centre to the provinces was a vital issue.

He said that under the devolution plan, the people had been further divided, while police had become more powerful.He was of the view that if nazmeen had been vested with the powers in the CrPC, there would have been a system of check and balance. He also called for abolishing the concurrent list.

Ms Shamim Qaisar, a councillor from Peshawar district council, had complaints against too much powers vested in the nazmeen and alleged that councillors representing workers, haris and others deprived sections of the society were being neglected in decision making.

She suggested that in order to make the local governments strong, it was necessary to include everyone in the decision making. She was also critical of Gen Musharraf for deliberately leaving doubts and loopholes in the system.

Deploring the NWFP governor's attitude toward women councillors, she alleged that for two-and-half years funds had not been allowed to be spent because of his discriminatory attitude.

Turbat Nazim Moula Baksh said the local government system was good but alleged that provincial governments were not allowing it to function properly. He claimed that the development which took place during the last three years could not be done during the past 56 years.

He said that the system would take time to entrench itself. He complained that due to provincial government's intervention, the district governments were finding it difficult to appoint officers of their choice.

District Gwadar's Nazim Baboo Gulab said that due to undue interference the working of local government was being affected. He also complained of shortage of funds in his district.