A CLASH of institutions emerging over Islamabad’s local government polls, scheduled for July 25, is threatening to overshadow the long-awaited elections in the capital. At the centre of the controversy is the disturbing fact that the Senate is yet to pass the bill that would give the green light for the polls, with the result that the ECP has announced a schedule — under Supreme Court orders — based on draft legislation. On Monday, the ECP came under a barrage of criticism in the Senate, led by Chairman Raza Rabbani. Mr Rabbani said the commission’s election-related activities were “without lawful authority”. Moreover, the upper house wants LG polls in the capital held on a party basis. In a related development, the attorney general told the Supreme Court on the same day that he did not expect the bill in question to be passed before Eid.

In principle, the Senate’s complaint is valid: legislation is purely parliament’s domain and it is inadvisable for other state institutions to encroach upon this territory. Yet it is equally true that were it not for the Supreme Court’s insistence on holding LG polls across Pakistan, elections would not have taken place in Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and in the cantonment areas. The apex court had in March ordered for polls to be held; thereafter, the National Assembly passed the Islamabad LG bill which went to the Senate in April. We are now well into July. Hence, we fail to realise why the upper house has not fast-tracked the passage of the legislation. If the senators had reservations about the bill and wanted to amend it, they should have gone ahead with their input and sent the legislation back to the lower house to be debated so that it could have become law by now. We can appreciate the Senate’s insistence on parliament’s sovereignty, but we also realise that the people of the federal capital have a constitutional right to elect their local representatives — a right that has been denied to them for several decades, and which lawmakers have blocked through their tardiness. The Senate needs to give the Islamabad LG bill the attention it deserves and keep the legislative process moving forward. If a slight delay is unavoidable perhaps a brief extension of the election date could be considered. However, there should be no compromise over the holding of LG polls in the capital so that democracy reaches the lowest tiers.

Published in Dawn, July 8th, 2015

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