In Pakistan, few people have access to their respective elected members of the provincial assembly, National Assembly and Senate. People in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa do not feel comfortable walking into the sprawling hujras (guest houses) of MPAs and MNAs to voice their genuine problems.

Observers say that the local government system bridged the gap between bureaucracy and masses.

Catastrophes proved no different. For instance, the elected official at the local level played a pivotal role in the aftermath of the devastating 2005 earthquake that had severely affected Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

Even more recently in 2009 when massive displacement took place from the Malakand Division due to the military operation, union council nazims and councillors in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa accommodated most of the displaced people. Around three million people were displaced due to the operation and many of them found shelter in the hujra and houses of the local leadership.

The latter also helped the donors and government agencies register the displaced people and then distribute food and non-food items.

But the past it seems is another country. By the time the floods came around this year and played havoc with life and property across the country, the local government system had been dismantled and its elected officials sent home. And because of this, the government's ability to reach out to the flood victims was limited. For instance, in the absence of the nazims and councillors, there was no proper forum to ensure the equitable distribution of food items among the survivors. Some received huge quantity of food items from the philanthropists while others did not even get a single food packet.

The 12,818 nazims and councillors in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were sent home when the provincial government dissolved all the local councils including the zila, tehsil, town and union councils on February 20, 2010 after the completion of their legal tenure of four years. The government also issued a notification the same day to appoint district coordination officers and tehsil municipal officers as administrators of their respective zila councils and tehsil councils.

Announcing the dissolution of the local councils at the February press conference, Provincial Minister for Local Government Bashir Ahmed Bilour promised that the next local bodies elections would be conducted within six months. However, the government is yet to announce a date.

But for those of us who follow Pakistani politics, this development brings no surprise. The history of local governments in Pakistan shows that elected governments never encouraged this system while undemocratic governments always have. This is not to say that military rulers care more for people and their needs — truth be told dictators need local governments system to provide a semblance of legitimacy to their undemocratic rule.

Pakistan's first military dictator Ayub Khan had introduced the Basic Democracies System in 1959. This was abolished by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who then introduced the People's Local Government Ordinance, 1972. However, during Bhutto's time no local level elections were ever held.

After Bhutto was removed through a military coup, the government of Gen Ziaul Haq introduced the local government system in 1979 and the four provincial governments promulgated ordinances the same year, which were amended from time to time.

Musharraf too repeated this history. He introduced the local government system which was abolished by those who came into power in 2008. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has introduced a bill – The NWFP Local Government Bill, 2010 – on March 25, 2010, which aims to repeal Gen Pervez Musharraf's NWFP Local Government Ordinance, 2001.

Analysts widely believe that the proposed law would clip the wings of nazims who were given different powers under Musharraf and would be left with nominal powers mostly related to municipality functions.

The bill was tabled in the assembly by the provincial minister for law and parliamentary affairs, Barrister Arshid Abdullah, on behalf of the local government minister, Bashir Ahmad Bilour. The bill was referred to a four-member select committee of the assembly for review. However despite the lapse of more then seven months, the bill is yet to be taken up by the assembly.

Very few people expect that the KP government or for that matter any of the other provincial governments will hold the local government elections. History repeats itself once again.