KARACHI: The Sindh High Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition of Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA) seeking postponement of the local government elections in Sindh.

The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf has also withdrawn an identical petition in order to approach the Supreme Court.

The petitioners had impugned the notification issued by the Election Commission of Pakistan to hold the first phase of the LG elections in four divisions of Sindh on June 26 arguing that it was issued without lawful authority and in violation of a Supreme Court judgement declaring various provisions of the Sindh Local Government Act, 2013 ultra vires of the Constitution.

However, an assistant advocate general and a law officer for the ECP argued that the impugned notification was in due consonance with law, adding that the schedule of the first phase had been determined in unison with the provincial government.

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A two-judge bench headed by Justice Mohammad Iqbal Kalhoro asked the lawyers for the petitioners to demonstrate as to how the notification in question had been issued without jurisdiction and to identify the ratio/directive of any apex court judgement that had been infringed.

The bench said that the lawyer for GDA remained unable to provide any sustainable response while the counsel for PTI, after arguing at some length, did not press the petition and submitted that since the impugned notification had been issued in violation of the apex court’s verdict, he was going to the Supreme Court for redressal of his grievances. Thereafter, the bench disposed of the petition of PTI.

About the petition of the GDA, the bench noted that the apex court in its judgement reiterated the importance of an elected local government and deprecated the exercise of its powers/functions by a provincial government.

It further said that entertaining the petition would prima facie and unjustifiably shelve the entire electoral process intended to devolve the political, administrative and financial responsibility and authority upon the elected representatives of a local government.

Therefore, the bench said that the petition was found to be devoid of any demonstrable merit and no case for invocation of discretionary writ jurisdiction was made out and the petition was dismissed accordingly.

The leaders of both the parties had approached the SHC challenging the ECP notification, issued on April 13, announcing schedule for conducting LG elections in the first phase in Sukkur, Larkana, Shaheed Benazirabad and Mirpurkhas divisions of the province on June 26.

The petitioners contended that the LG elections could not be conducted until new local government law was enacted in the light of the apex court order as they submitted that the LG elections under the SLGA 2013 was not only a futile exercise, but also wastage of financial resources.

Published in Dawn, May 25th, 2022