ISLAMBAD: A minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has said the ruling coalition has taken a political risk of annoying bureaucracy by deciding to establish a strong and powerful local government system in the province.

“We are actually gambling on the matter, but it is based on our principled stance not only to hold the LG elections in the province but also give the people to be elected due powers to serve the masses in a better way,” Local Government Minister Inayatullah Khan told journalists on Friday.

The LG elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa will be held on May 30 and ballot papers are being printed in the Printing Press of Pakistan in Islamabad.

Also read: ECP summons more KP politicians for ‘violating’ code of conduct

Inayatullah Khan, who belongs to Jamaat-i-Islami which is a partner in the PTI-led coalition government in KP, said there was no election alliance or seat adjustment with the PTI or any other party for the coming elections.

He said that bureaucracy and even some political forces had expressed reservations over devolution of powers to districts and tehsils. They feared that councillors and nazims belonging to smaller parties would also be elected and they would protect the interest of their constituencies even if they had to move against the provincial government, he added.

“Many have even warned us that by strengthening local governments we are actually empowering the opponents in many districts,” Mr Khan said. But this was the essence of democracy, he added.

He said that elections would be held on a non-party basis at the tehsil level and on party basis at the district level. Only the member of a relevant council can become a member of tehsil or district.

“The policy has been devised to ensure that only an elected person becomes nazim, while at the district level no member can vote for a nazim beyond party lines,” Mr Khan said, adding: “We believe that local governments are the basic stage of democracy and there has to be political discipline and ethics at this level too.”

The KP government has decided to allocate 30 per cent of the development budget for local governments and most of the functions, except highways and major arteries, colleges and universities, tertiary hospitals, etc, will be transferred to districts.

“It is expected that devolution of functions and departments will be completed in July. By that time newly elected councillors and nazims would have taken oath,” Mr Khan said.

Published in Dawn, May 23rd, 2015

On a mobile phone? Get the Dawn Mobile App: Apple Store | Google Play