Passed with majority: Legislative hurdle cleared

The bill will become an act once the president signs it.

ISLAMABAD:

The lower house of the parliament passed on Wednesday a bill paving the way for local government elections in Islamabad.

The National Assembly passed the bill with a majority vote.

It will become effective once President Mamnoon Hussain signs the bill into law, likely this week.

The Election Commission of Pakistan will announce fresh schedule to hold the local government (LG) elections in the capital.

The bill, which had already been passed by the Senate with amendments, was moved by Minister of State for Interior Balighur Rehman in the Lower House of Parliament.

Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar confirmed that the government accepted all recommendations given by the opposition on the legislation in the Senate.

Though Pakistan Tehreek-e- Insaf (PTI) lawmakers urged the government to pass on this bill to the relevant NA panel for review, the government seemed in hurry to get it passed from the Lower House arguing the passage of the bill was needed to hold early LG polls in the capital.

PTI MNA Asad Umar requested to hand over this bill to the relevant standing committee for thorough review.  He pointed out clause 25-b of the bill, which stated that a youth candidate must be more than 25 years of age. It seems like an honest mistake, he observed, saying an amendment is needed as the clause should read that the youth seat is for persons less than 25 years of age.

A ruling to amend clause 25-b of the bill was then passed by Deputy Speaker Javed Abbasi.

PTI Vice-Chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the Senate had debated the bill thoroughly. “Send this bill to the committee and don’t go in a hurry — it’ll be a fine-tuned piece of legislation,” said the PTI leader.

The interior minister said the government accepted all the recommendations given by the opposition on this piece of legislation in the Senate. The credit goes to the ruling party which is extremely interested in holding the local government polls, he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 30^th, 2015.