LB elections: Sindh prepares to face Supreme Court

Body formed to define roles of commissioners and administrators.

KARACHI: The government has once again failed to define administrative role of commissioners, deputy commissioners and administrators appointed following the revival of local government system of 1979 in Sindh. 

A meeting at Chief Minister House on Wednesday constituted a nine-member committee to help define the roles of these administrative positions for the smooth functioning of the local government institutions and district management.

The nine-member committee comprising the law and parliamentary affairs minister, Ayaz Soomro, local government minister, Agha Siraj Durrani, chief secretary, secretaries local government, law and finance and members of the coalition partners, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement and Pakistan Muslim League (F) has been tasked with making recommendations in seven days.

Meanwhile, another meeting presided over by Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah discussed the response the Sindh government is required to submit to the Supreme Court on April 30 on the issue of the delay in local government elections.

Sources privy to the meeting told The Express Tribune that it was decided to link the delay with the verification of electoral rolls and delimitation of constituencies. These sources said that government may also issue an ordinance to delay the election for another six months or a year.

But before exercising this option, the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party has to take its major coalition partner, the MQM, into confidence, as it has been insisting on holding the election without any delay.

“The chief secretary and advocate general will submit a report citing the reason for not holding the election and plans,” sources said.   The meeting was attended, among others, by Syed Murad Ali Shah, Raja Muhammad Abbas, Abdul Fatah Malik.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 19^th, 2012.