PESHAWAR, Aug 28: Speakers at a seminar on Thursday expressed the fear that the local government system — introduced by the military regime preceding the installation of the elected government — was a move towards the restoration of the One-Unit system and an encroachment upon the provincial autonomy.

The two-day-long seminar on ‘Problems, Solution and Responsibilities of the Federal, Provincial and Local Governments’ was organised by a Lahore-based NGO, Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development And Transparency for MPAs and district nazims of the NWFP here at a local hotel to assess the viability of the new system.

On the second consecutive day of the seminar, NWFP minister for local bodies Sardar Mohammad Idrees said some vested interest, who had looted the province during the previous martial law regime, was conspiring to create problems for the elected government.

He said the en bloc resignations by the district nazim was also a handiwork of that clique.

Terming the ganging up of district nazims mere blackmailing tactics, he said: “We do not accept any association or platform by the nazims ... We will not support anybody whether he survives a no-trust motion or not”.

Deliberating upon what he called flaws in the Local Government Ordinance, 2001, Sardar Idress urged the National Reconstruction Bureau for immediate correction, saying that the system had been devised to make the delivery of services effective, enforcing good governance, making financial management flawless. People, he added, themselves would witness whether or they achieved all this or not.

Naeemul Haq, an NRB member, said the present system, which had replaced the all-powerful deputy commissioners and police superintendents, gave powers to the nazims, who had been elected by the people.

Terming it a great achievement on part of the NRB, he said that the local government system had replaced the out-dated colonial-era system. He said that with the passage of time, reconstruction of the municipal system and decentralisation of administrative powers would bring change to the social system.

He said: “The people, who are unaccustomed to the new system, will learn to live with the changes in the present system ... There is a knowledge-gap on the part of people ...”

Abdul Akbar Khan of the People’s Party Parliamentarians said the military regime had brought scores of changes in the ordinance, but it (the federal government) was not ready to allow the provincial government to do so. So long as the local government was part of the Schedule IV of the Constitution, provincial governments were powerless, he added.

Mohammad Haneef Ramay, a former chief minister of Punjab and a PPP leader, said that reality was mostly moulded by public perception, adding that if people developed wrong impression about a system, it would certainly fail to start functioning, he said.

He was of the opinion that the local government system was an encroachment upon the provincial rights.