07 January 2005	Friday	25 Ziqa'ad 1425

ISLAMABAD, Jan 6: A group of civil society organizations has rejected the proposed changes in the Local Government (LG) Ordinance and announced that they would launch a protest campaign against the government's plan to reduce the number of members in union councils.

This was said by representatives of various civil society organizations after at an emergency meeting here on Thursday. The meeting was attended by representatives of the Pattan Development Organization, SDPI, Aurat Foundation, Action Aid, Partners in Development and Women Councillors Network.

Rejecting the government's plan, they announced the holding of a protest march in Islamabad and stage a sit-in outside the Parliament House on January 14.

Giving briefing to a group of reporters after the meeting, the coordinator of Pattan Development Organization Sarwar Bari, and office-bearers of Women Councillors' Network Mrs Shafqat Taqi and Qaisera Ismail said after the protest march, a seminar would be held on January 15 in which the civil society members would present their concerns and their recommendations on the issue.

He said the participants of the meeting were of the view that reduction in the number of seats in union councils would seriously impact the ability of the common man to become part of the local level decision-making process.

Mr Bari demanded that the proposed amendments must be open to public scrutiny and debate before being incorporated into the ordinance. Mr Bari said the participants also passed a resolution at the end of the meeting, which stated that there should be no reduction in the number of seats in union councils, neither should there be any decrease in the number of seats for women.

He said the meeting also agreed to adopt the demands raised by the Women Councillors Network, the only elected body of over 2,000 women councillors in 11 districts of the Punjab, in its provincial convention, held in September 2004.

The civil society members have demanded that a 33 per cent seats of Nazims should be allocated for women and district and Tehsil Nazims and Naib Nazims should be elected directly by the people, as is the case with Union Nazims and Naib Nazims.

They also called for recognizing the role of opposition in the district government system and that the next elections should be held on joint electorate system like general elections of October 2002.

Mr Bari expressed the fear that the National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) was also considering an option to reduce the number of union councils by merging three councils into one. He said they would also oppose any such move by the NRB. He said any such decision would be a set-back for the democratisation process in the country.

Responding to a question, Mr Bari said there were differences within the civil society organizations over the government's decision to hold local government elections on non- party basis.

However, he claimed, that a majority of the women councillors wanted elections on non-party basis. He said they would build up pressure on the government to restrain it from changing the LG Ordinance.