ISLAMABAD: At a time when the Election Commission (ECP) had already announced the schedule for holding the local government elections in the federal capital on October 9, the federal government, while bulldozing rules on Monday, got a controversial bill approved from the National Assembly to amend the Islamabad Local Government Act.

The bill was presented in the National Assembly by Law Minister Azam Nazir Tarar on behalf of the interior minister and was passed amid opposition from the PTI.

PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan opposed the bill and said if this legislation was imperative it should be stopped for the time being as the schedule had already been announced to hold the elections in Islamabad.

The opposition members sought an assurance from the law minster that the elections will not face any delay. However, Mr Tarar did not give any assurance and put the ball in the court of Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) stating that holding elections was the sole domain of the commission.

Law minister refuses to give assurance that polls will be held as scheduled, says it is sole domain of ECP

Similarly, PML-N chief whip and MNA from Islamabad Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhry said if there was a little delay in the elections there should be no issue as “we want to introduce the best local government model.” He said the government wanted to have a local government system in Islamabad like the ones in New Delhi and London.

Another PML-N MNA from Islamabad Raja Khurram Nawaz said instead of the previous flawed system, the government wanted to have a vibrant local government to resolve issues of public.

The bill, ‘Islamabad Capital Territory Local Government (Amendment) Bill 2024’ was approved by National Assembly while suspending rules. Sources said now there are chances that the bill will also be passed by Senate in the upcoming session slated to start on Tuesday (today).

It will become law after the consent of the president.

In the new bill, the government has increased the number of general seats of union councils (UCs) from existing six to nine and the seats of women from two to three.

This means that a new delimitation of constituencies will be required which is a time-taking process. In that scenario, elections cannot be held on October 9 as scheduled.

On August 20, the local government elections saw a setback when ECP extended the schedule, deciding that the polling will be held on October 9, instead of the earlier announced date of September 29.

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Soon after the ECP issued a notification to extend the schedule, PTI local chapter had alleged something fishy behind the move, adding the government wanted to get a bill passed from parliament to make amendments to the Local Government Act 2015 to avoid holding the polls.

However, the ECP had stated that on the request of political parties and to ensure maximum participation by candidates and provide them facilities, it had decided to extend the nomination papers’ submission date till August 28 and the polling will be held on October 9.

Former opposition leader in Metropolitan Corporation Islamabad (MCI) and PTI leader Sheraz Kiani alleged that the government through new legislation was trying to avoid the elections.

“The knows PTI will win over 80pc seats in the local government elections and the new mayor will be from PTI; therefore, they want to avoid elections,” he said and added that high inflation and exorbitant electricity tariffs had badly affected residents of Islamabad and they were waiting to vote against the government as they did in the February 8 general elections. He said that this was third time the government was avoiding elections in the name of legislation.

Earlier, elections were all set to be held in 50 UCs, but the former PDM government said instead of 50 UCs, there should be 101 union councils. Under this excuse, they got the elections delayed. Later, when arrangements were finalised to hold elections in 101 UCs, the PDM government came up with a new idea of increasing the number of UCs from 101 to 125.

Now, when the elections were going to be held in 125 UCs, the government came up with the idea of increasing the number of general seats in UCs.

Meanwhile, former deputy mayor of PML-N Syed Zeeshan Naqvi denied that the government was evading the elections, adding new legislation was meant for better composition of the union councils.

According to officials, one million voters would cast their votes to elect their representatives in the 125 union councils of Islamabad.

The local government’s tenure ended in February 2021. According to elections law, new elections should have been held within six months.

The last elections were held in 2016 which were won by PML-N and Sheikh Anser Aziz was elected as the first mayor of Islamabad. However, the MCI failed to deliver as it could not get the patronage of the then-ruling party, the PML-N. The MCI was neither given funds by the federal government nor were its financial rules finalised for proper disposal of works.

Later, the PTI came to power at the centre but it too did not pay any heed to the MCI. As a result, the first-ever local government completed its tenure without even paying the due honorarium to the union council (UC) chairmen.

Published in Dawn, August 27th, 2024