PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Monday witnessed a heated debate over the proposed abolition of district councils in the province with the opposition declaring the possible government move a violation of the Constitution.

Members of the opposition benches asked the government to remove flaws from the current three-tier local government system instead of doing away with its district tier.

They also claimed that the government wanted to grab the powers of district councils through their abolition.

The session was chaired by Speaker Mushtaq Ahmad Ghani.

Opposition calls possible govt move unconstitutional, minister says suggestions will be incorporated in bill

The PTI government has decided to abolish district councils and retain town/tehsil and village and neighborhood councils by proposing changes to the LG system existing in the province.

Former local government minister and Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal lawmaker Inayatullah said the proposed end to the district tier of the LG system was a violation of Articles 32, 37 and 140-A of the Constitution.

Mr Inayatullah, who was part of the exercise of introducing the current local body system in the province as a senior minister in the last PTI government, said the existing LG system was far better than others.

He, however, said the current LG system had certain flaws, which needed to be removed.

“If the provincial government doesn’t withdraw its decision of abolishing district councils through the proposed drastic amendments to the KP Local Government Act, 2013, anyone can challenge it in the court of law. And if that happens, I am sure that the court will instantly issue a stay order against those amendments,” he said.

Leader of the opposition Akram Khan Durrani criticised the government for not releasing the required funds to the three tiers of the local government system declaring it a violation of the LG law.

He said under the Local Government Act, 30 percent of the provincial annual development programme funds would be given away to local bodies, including district, tehsil/town, and village and neighbourhood councils.

Mr Durrani said Prime Minister Imran Khan had been propagating the effectiveness of the KP local government system almost in each public meeting across the country, so I wonder if that was so, why the ruling PTI had decided to do away with the major and important tier of that system.

He said district councillors protested outside the KP Assembly’s building recently against the denial of their legal share in development funds by the provincial government.

The provincial government has released half of the Rs29 billion funds to the local bodies in the 2018-19 budget though the fourth quarter of the current fiscal has already begun.

Participating in the debate, parliamentary leader of ANP Sardar Hussain Babak said the PTI government hadn’t respected its own law by withholding the local bodies’ funds for the last four years.

He alleged that the government had denied local bodies the most part of their share in development funds as only 15 percent of the total amount meant for them had been released during the last four years.

Mr Babak asked the treasury to avoid taking decisions about important legislations outside the assembly.

“We are receiving information about the upcoming changes to the local government system through media. Why the government didn’t bring this issue on the floor of the house,” he said.

The ANP leader also demanded of the government to conduct local body elections in the province on party basis.

Maulana Luftur Rehman of the MMA asked the government how it would fill the vacuum left in the local government system after the district councils were done away with.

“The abolition of the district tier shows the government’s mala fide intentions as in this way the provincial government would assume the powers of the district tier, he said.

Responding to the points of the opposition lawmakers, information minister Shaukat Yousafzai said the province’s local body system was far better than those prevailing in other provinces.

He said consultation was under way on the proposed amendments to LG Act and once that was over, they would be taken to the cabinet for approval before being tabled in the assembly.

Mr Yousafzai assured the opposition members that their suggestions would be incorporated while amending the law.

Special assistant to the chief minister on science and technology department Kamran Khan tabled the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Youth Welfare Endowment Fund Bill, 2019.

The chair adjourned the session until today (Tuesday).

Published in Dawn, April 9th, 2019