PESHAWAR: The provincial assembly on Tuesday passed the Khyber Pukhtunkhwa Local Government Bill 2012 and with the commencement of this Act, the NWFP Local Government Ordinance 2011 shall be repealed and all local government created under the said law shall stand dissolved.

However to avoid vacuum and continue the municipal services in the province till new local government elections, a clause had been indicted in the bill.

According to this clause all authorities and all officers who immediately before enforcement of the act were exercising functions of local governments, shall continue to exercise their respective functions till the local councils are constituted under this act.

The bill was presented by Senior Minister Bashir Ahmad Bilour who claimed that Khyber Pukhtunkhwa was the first province which has been able to present the local government act in its assembly.

The minister while responding to various suggestions and objections stated that there were three main flaws in the NWFP Local Government Ordinance 2001, as it devolved 18 departments and being single head, the then district Nazim was unable to control all these departments.

Similarly the District Nazim was unable to exercise the executive powers and control law and order situation whenever it had arisen. The third main flaw in the system was unification of urban and rural areas, he opined.

The house passed the bill, which was already amended by the select committee of the provincial assembly. Bashir Bilour said that with the passage of the act, Khyber Pukhtunkhwa had taken the lead as no other province had even introduced a local government bill in their respective assemblies.