LG Amendment Bill passed amid pandemonium in K-P Assembly

Opposition members surround speaker’s dais, chant slogans, tear agenda copies

PESHAWAR: The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Monday passed Local Government (Amendment) Bill with majority of votes amid uproar by the opposition members.

Awami National Party (ANP) lawmaker Bahadur Khan wanted to speak on a point of objection but he was not permitted by Speaker Mushtaq Ghani.

Bahdur, under protest, tore the copy of agenda and walked out of the assembly. His action charged opposition members who gathered around the speaker’s dais chanting slogans, whistling and even banging on the dais.

The speaker tried to calm down the opposition members but failed and the situation grew tense, compelling him to call in the security staff which surrounded the protesting lawmakers.

However, during the commotion, the treasury benches kept quiet.

Amid the ruckus, Speaker Ghani started taking approval for the bill.

Opposition rejects LG Amendment Bill

Passing of a legislation amid a protest infuriated opposition. Led by Leader of Opposition Akram Durrani they recorded the longest protest in the history of K-P Assembly and tore copies of agenda throwing pieces of paper in the air.

Nevertheless, speaker continued taking clause wise approval of the Local Government (Amendment) Bill 2019 despite the protest of the opposition continued. The government members tapped desks in happiness.

According to the bill, the district level setup and district nazim office has been ended. Most of the powers have been transferred to the tehsil nazims.

The offices of nazim and naib-nazim have been transformed to chairman and convener respectively. In a bid to keep uniformity in local bodies, the provincial government will provide the policy framework.

Cities and villages will have neighbourhood and village councils respectively. A council would be comprised of seven members including three general members.

The chairman of cities would be called mayors. The chairman will have the administrative authority.

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In Peshawar, there would be two city local governments while in other cities the provincial government will announce the establishment of city local governments in other cities.

The registration of birth, marriage and deaths would also be done on lower level.

Provincial Law Minister Sultan Muhammad Khan presented a bill to continue already imposed laws in the tribal areas before 25th amendment without any impact on Frontier Crimes Regulations 1901 and Interim Governance Regulations 2018 and they would be considered as abolished.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 30^th, 2019.