June 23, 2005	Thursday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 15, 1426

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PESHAWAR, June 22: Chairman Tehsil Towns Nazimeen Association Haroon Bilour rejected amendments made in the Local Government Ordinance (LGO), 2001, on Wednesday and asked the government to restore the ordinance in its original form, otherwise they would challenge these one-sided amendments incorporated into the ordinance in court.

He said: “There is no justification to transform towns into Tehsil,” and added that the centre did it to protect their interest in a different form.

Mr Bilour, who is also a Nazim of the town, said: “We have strong reservations against three main amendments which include the authority given to the chief minister to suspend the Nazim for three months, the transformation of town into Tehsil and appointment of caretakers in place of Nazims for the coming local bodies’ elections.

Commenting on the appointment of caretakers, Mr Bilour said that the government had some reservations that the Nazims would favour their party candidates, and added that no allegation had been levelled against Nazims in the 2002 general election, which is considered to be the fairest election held so far in Pakistan.

He said that in the light of amendments made in the LGO, the district Nazim could be suspended for three months by the NWFP chief minister, which was unjust with the local bodies.

He continued that another disadvantage of the newly-introduced LGO was that a Nazim could be removed by a simple majority in the house, which was a joke with democracy.

He said: “We have demanded that members for the Local Government Commission must be appointed equally from both the government and the opposition but the government picked four members of their own while only one from the opposition.”

He wondered whether it was possible to decide on merit under such a situation.

Mr Haroon said that it had been suggested to the government that the Local Government Commission must be led by a judge of the Peshawar High Court but in vain.

He lauded the MMA government in the NWFP for extending all possible support and cooperation without any sort of discrimination.

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