QUETTA, May 5: The Quetta City District Government Naib Nazim and six other Nazims and councillors observed a four-hour token hunger strike to press the provincial government for giving control of the Water and Sewerage Authority to the district government as is mandated by Local Government Ordinance 2001.

Besides Wasa, the councillors want agriculture market committee and financial matters to be under their domain. Prominent among those who observed the hunger strike on Wednesday were: Mir Wali Muhammad Lehri, Naib Nazim; Haji Abdur Rehman, Gul Noor Bugti, Muhammad Younus, Malik Hanif, Haji Muhammad Ishaq Achakzai and Sadozi Nasar.

Talking to newsmen at the hunger strike camp set up in the premises of the city government, District Nazim Mohammad Rahim Kakar said the protest of the councillors would continue till the provincial government responded positively to resolve three issues - Wasa handover to local government, agriculture market committee handover to the local government and LG control over financial matters.

He said the district government was facing a shortfall of Rs150 million in non-development expenditures. "We are also facing problems in implementing development schemes."

Mr Kakar said that chairman of National Reconstruction Bureau Daniyal Aziz would visit Quetta on May 7, and expressed the hope that the NRB chairman would settle the dispute between Nazims and provincial government on Wasa and other matters.

The District nazim said that had the provincial government followed the ordinance 2001 in letter and in spirit there would have been no problem. He was of the view that deviation from the said ordinance had created differences.

Justifying the protest, Mr Kakar said that Wasa was attached to the district government since the creation of the new system after local bodies elections but the provincial government, through an administrative order, had separated it on Jan 17, 2004.