ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan People's Party and Muttahida Qaumi Movement have decided to keep the local government (LG) system of Gen (retd) Pervez Musharraf in force in Sindh, sources told Dawn on Sunday.

They said that the commissionerate system would not be introduced in Sindh because the two parties had reached a fresh understanding which led the MQM to announce that it would rejoin the federal cabinet.

“It has been decided by the two parties that unlike other provinces the commissionerate system will not be introduced in Sindh,” said MQM leader Zahid Mehmood.

He said his party had been urging the PPP to hold local body elections which were due last year.

President Asif Ali Zardari's spokesman Farhatullah Babar said: “The PPP had once decided to table the commissionerate system bill in the provincial assembly after the MQM parted ways with the government.”

The proposal to change the local government system in Sindh was believed to be one of the main differences between the PPP and MQM.

Besides replacing the old LG system, the commissionerate system envisaged the division of Karachi into four districts as had been done in Hyderabad, but the MQM has opposed the proposal.

The commissionerate system bill was to be tabled in the provincial assembly on January 7, but the MQM put pressure on the PPP not to change the LG system.

Other three provincial governments have already wrapped up the local government system, but have not come up with an alternative so far.

The Balochistan government has enacted its own LG law, but it is reported to have many flaws.

The draft of LG law prepared by the Punjab government also has several discrepancies.

Punjab Minister Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman told a private TV channel recently that his government had prepared the draft law which would be approved by the cabinet soon and tabled it in the provincial assembly. The new law, he said, would remove the flaws in the previous system.

Former chairman of the NRB Daniyal Aziz told Dawn that the draft prepared by the Punjab government had a number of flaws and it could not be implemented. He said he would brief the media on the issue in a couple of days.