LAHORE, March 24: Councillors elected against the seats reserved for special interest groups (women, peasants, workers and minorities) are considered inferior to those elected against general seats.

The ‘divide’ between the general and special seat councillors was created during the Zia period when development funds were allocated to the former instead of asking them to approve schemes for implementation by local government staff.

At that time, councillors elected against special seats were in minority. They were elected indirectly by the councillors elected against the general seats. But now they constitute the majority in every UC and can elect the nazims and naib nazims without the support of the general councillors who consider themselves to be the ‘genuine councillors’..

A union council consisting of 21 members includes a nazim, a naib nazim, eight general councillors, four women councillors and six councillors representing special interest groups, including two women and four labour/farmers councillors (labour councillors in cities and farmer’s councillors in rural areas) and one minority councillor. Thus a union council has 11 councillors representing special interest groups against eight general councillors.

The voting strength of the general councillors increases to 10 when the UC Nazim and Naib Nazim join hands with them. Even then the councillors representing special interest groups can easily defeat them with their voting strength.

The general and the special group councillors are equal before the law. Both have been elected directly to attend meetings of their respective councils and take decisions in respect of the approval of the budget imposition of taxes and development of the areas under the jurisdiction of their respective UCs under the Local Government Ordinance provisions. The councils take all their decisions on the basis of a majority vote and the voting rights of councillors representing special interest groups are equal to those of the general councillors.

The dispute in respect of superiority begins when the councillors representing special interest groups insist on allocation of an equal share of funds instead of presenting their development schemes for the approval of their councils by a majority vote.

The question of the allocation of development funds to the councillors elected against special seats was raised at the budget meeting of the Lahore District Council held in December last year. Minority councillors even staged a sit-in at the Jinnah Hall gate for several days till the Punjab Governor assured them that their demands would be accepted.

The Punjab Local Government Ordinance, 2001, is silent about the allocation of funds to councillors for utilization on the development schemes of their choice. It contains only the number of various categories of councillors to be elected to the local bodies like the union councils,tehsil/town councils and the district councils.

The councillors, according to the ordinance, are required to elect the nazims and naib nazims, attend the meetings of their respective councils for approval of the budget and become the members of various committees to be constituted by the councils.