PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court larger bench on Monday reserved its judgment on three petitions of the opposition leaders against the May 2019 drastic changes to the provincial local government law, including abolition of the district tier of the government in the province.

Justice Roohul Amin Khan, Justice Ijaz Anwar and Justice Syed Arshad Ali heard arguments advanced by provincial advocate general Shumail Ahmad Butt and counsel for petitioners, including Qazi Jawad Ahsanullah, Khushdil Khan, Ghulam Mohyuddin Malik and others.

One petition was jointly filed by leader of the opposition in KP Assembly Akram Khan Durrani and parliamentary leaders Sardar Hussain Babak of the Awami National Party, Sardar Mohammad Yousaf of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, Sher Azam Wazir of the Pakistan Peoples Party and Lutfur Rehman of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl.

The petitioners requested the court to declare that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Local Government (Amendment) Act, 2019, through which widespread changes were made to the KP Local Government Act, 2013, was in conflict with the Constitution, especially Articles 4, 8, 9, 17, 25, 32, 37 and 140-A.

AG insists govt authorised to introduce local body system in light of province’s situation

Another petition was filed jointly by Jamaat-i-Islami provincial chief Senator Mushtaq Ahmad Khan and MPA Inayatullah Khan, who claimed that the purpose of the impugned amendments to the LG law was to devolve some powers of the district council and district nazim to the tehsil government and return the rest to the government.

They added that the amended Act was aimed at returning the control of many devolved departments to the provincial government and to abolish district tier of the local government system.

The third petition was filed by the president of Local Council Association (LCA), Himayatullah Mayar, who has twice served as district nazim of Mardan.

The petitioner requested the court to declare the abolition of district tier of the local government in the province against the law and Article 140-A of the Constitution, which guaranteed devolving political, administrative and financial responsibility and authority to elected representatives of the local governments..

He prayed the court to declare that the financial authority and responsibility of local governments in view of Article 140-A of the Constitution cannot be taken away by the province.

Qazi Jawad said through the impugned Amendment Act, Chapters III and IV of the parent Local Government Act (LGA) 2013 were deleted. He added that by removing the two chapters, the government had removed the entire edifice of representative and elected system of local government at district level.

The lawyer contended that because of this amendment though local government did exist at district level, it would neither be elected nor representative, or even political, and there would be no administrative and financial control of the people in the said local government at district level.

He added that this administrative and financial control would be exercised by non-elected officials on district level.

The counsel said many departments which were earlier part and parcel of district local government system by virtue of Section 12 read with First Schedule of the un-amended LGA, had now been devolved to the local government at tehsil level. He said that this drastic change and amendment had been brought abruptly in complete ignorance of the parent law.

Another anomaly, he pointed out, which had been created through the impugned Amendment Act was introduction of Section 21, whereby the office of the chairman tehsil council had been provided to be directly elected through party-based polls, whereas members of tehsil council would be elected on non-party based polls.

Mr Khushdil contended that a democratic dispensation included three tiers of governments including federal, provincial and district. He contended that district tier of government was a vital part of local government and by abolishing the same the government had acted in negation of the constitution.

The advocate general requested the bench to dismiss petitions saying the government was ‘fully competent to introduce a local government system in accordance with peculiar situation in that province’.

He added that it was not mandatory under the Constitution for all four provinces to have identical systems of local self-governance.

Mr Butt said if it was a constitutional requirement, the KP government would also have introduced a system similar to other provinces.

Published in Dawn, November 2nd, 2021