KARACHI, June 17: When Gen Pervez Musharraf had unfolded his devolution plan, many people had questioned its wisdom and intent.

Apprehensions were expressed about possible exploitation of the system by the regime to destabilize central and provincial governments on the one hand and to maintain firm financial and administrative control over the lower tiers.

The government’s intrusive control through various sections of the Local Government Ordinance was evident in the manner in which Nazims in the NWFP were manipulated against the provincial government.

In Sindh, the system is being exploited by the provincial government to tame the Nazims who do not belong to the ruling coalition. This was anticipated at a very early stage of the so-called devolution plan. The conflicting claims to authority made by the provincial government and local government chiefs has had the most deleterious effect on Karachi where development work has slowed down.

Karachi is suffering because everything is being viewed in the context of the acrimonious relationship between the MQM and the Jamaat-i-Islami. Their petty power politics indicates that perhaps there are elements within them who are not concerned with the development of the city infrastructure and resolution of the people’s basic problems. They simply want to take credit and maintain their upper hand.

That was one of the main reasons why the NRB’s Daniyal Aziz spent so many hours at the Governor’s House at the weekend. Some of the grievances of the Nazims are common all over the province. These pertain to alleged interference by provincial ministers and attempts to strangulate the local bodies through various delaying administrative tactics.

We have seen that owing to such narrow-minded politics, Karachi’s mass transit system has been shelved, its water supply system remains precarious, and its roads remain battered, choked and inundated by overflowing gutters. Educational institutions, which in the past were a source of pride for Karachiites, are in decline. Despite the potential to become a forward-looking, developed city, Karachi has become a city condemned as a hub of terrorism and bigotry. It is the responsibility of all of us to change this. But the administrative and financial controls vested with the provincial administration have already made the independence of elected representatives a myth.

In the context of administrative control, Section 25 of the Sindh local body law is unique as it deals with setting aside an order of a Zila Nazim by the chief executive of the province. Its sub-section (1) says: “The Local Commission may, on its own accord or on receipt of an information or on an application, take notice of an order or decision of general application passed by Zila Nazim and recommend to the Chief Executive of the Province for its quashment, if in the opinion of the Commission such order or decision of the Zila Nazim is against the public policy or interest of the people.”

As the internal sources of finance of all the municipal bodies’ area are not enough to enable them to discharge their functions, it has already made them increasingly dependent on the government. This has become clear from the discrimination in the distribution of services by the municipalities. The huge number of slum dwellers who constitute a significant section of the urban population is still deprived of these services.

An already weak local government system has been rendered weaker by lack of appropriate political direction, enervating traditional administrative and representative institutions at the different levels of administration. The creation of parallel political and administrative institutions has led to conflict of jurisdiction and reluctance on the part of political authority to devolve power to representative institutions at the local level.