KARACHI: Confirming that talks with the Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) were going on, Sindh Information Minister Saeed Ghani on Monday made it clear that the demands of the right-wing opposition party were not “practicable” with least chances of their incorporation in the recently passed Sindh Local Government (Amendment) Act.

He shared the fresh thoughts while addressing a press conference at the Sindh Assembly’s committee room.

He reiterated that it was the right of the majority party i.e. the Pakistan Peoples Party to devise a law and the one in minority could not dictate for the legislation of its choice.

“A party [JI] with just one member in the Sindh Assembly is dictating the majority party having 100 MPAs to adopt the local government law of its own choice,” he said to a question about the status of the government-JI talks on the LG law.

“The Constitution fully empowers the majority party in the assembly to do the legislation of its choice. Although talks are going on, but their [JI] demands cannot be included in the provincial local government law,” he declared.

He claimed that the local government affairs and strong reaction from the opposition parties against the recently-passed LG law demanding an empowered city government were not an issue of public interest.

It was created only to divert attention from the genuine problems, he felt.

Mr Ghani was of the view that the people of Karachi had rejected the opposition parties’ move to hold a joint protest in the city against the provincial local government law two days ago.

Published in Dawn, January 18th, 2022