KARACHI:
In what appears to be an abandonment of the possibility of compromise, the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) on Monday decided to submit legislation in the Sindh Assembly to revive the 1979 local government system – also referred to as the ‘commissionerate system’ – and the 1861 Police Act during the upcoming session of the provincial legislature on Wednesday.
The decision was taken at a meeting of the party’s parliamentary committee, held under the chairmanship of Pir Mazharul Haq at the Sindh Chief Minister House in Karachi. The meeting was attended by as many 76 provincial lawmakers and senior party members.
Sources told The Express Tribune that the PPP would take advantage of its majority in the Sindh Assembly to pass all three ordinances that had been passed by the acting Sindh governor, Nisar Ahmed Khuhro, on July 9. The sources added that the party would also present legislation that it had ‘held back on’ when it was allied with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), including bills to revive the Malir and Lyari Development Authorities, which the MQM opposes.
A majority of the legislators present at the meeting wanted the 1979 local government system back without any amendments, said sources familiar with the discussions, apparently debunking reports that the PPP would consider amendments proposed by erstwhile allies, the MQM.
“There was a one point agenda: the upcoming legislation,” said one of the MPAs present at the meeting.
The next Sindh Assembly session, scheduled for Wednesday, had been requisitioned by the MQM members of the legislature.
Sources said that the MQM’s provincial legislators would meet at the party’s headquarters in Karachi to finalise a strategy on Tuesday (today) ahead of the Wednesday session of the Sindh Assembly. MPAs from the MQM have submitted five adjournment motions on Monday for the Sindh Assembly session to be held on July 13, in what appears to be an opening move towards a showdown in the legislature on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, sources privy to the meeting told The Express Tribune that Pir Mazhar, the PPP parliamentary leader in the Sindh Assembly, said that President Asif Ali Zardari’s policy of trying to pacify the MQM was over. “Enough is enough,” he is reported to have said.
Pir Mazhar’s rhetoric stands in sharp contrast to statements made by the new Sindh home minister, Manzoor Wasan, who said that he “dreamed of the MQM coming back to join the government.”
“We are not in a rush to accept the resignations of our friends [in the MQM] and I hope they will come to fold,” he said, referring to the fact that the government has still not accepted the resignations of the MQM members of the Sindh cabinet, which were submitted more than two weeks ago, on June 27.
Wasan’s sentiments had been echoed earlier in the day by Federal Interior Minister Rehman Malik, who also claimed the government was willing to work with the MQM.
“Our doors are always open for Muttahida. We have no reservations, but they are annoyed with us,” he said.
Malik was chairing a meeting at the Sindh Chief Minister’s House of PPP legislators from Karachi, who demanded an audit of the city government and called for an ‘unmasking’ of those responsible for target killing in the financial capital of the country.
PPP internal dissent simmers
The ruling party, meanwhile, appeared to give in to pressure from within its own ranks and did not reintegrate Kamber Shahdadkot district into Larkana, as had been initially planned. Sindh Food Minister Nadir Magsi, whose constituency falls in Shahdadkot, had been opposed to the move.
No decision has also been made so far on changes to the status of Dadu, Tharparkar and Jacobabad districts, all three of which had been bifurcated to give Jamshoro, Umerkot and Kashmore, the status of districts as well.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 12th, 2011.
COMMENTS (5)
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@Munsif Ali:
Isn't the overwhelming majority of the people of Karachi and Hyderabad considered people of Pakistan.
Commissionarate system is being forced upon at the behest of the feudal lords not the people of Pakistan, They had served as the slaves of the brits and still want to keep the people of Sindh in the stone age.
As far as the people of Karachi and Hyderabad is concerned, they are the most educated, civilized and traveled. I believe they will revolt if this system will be shoved down their throat. The consequences will be very similar to that of 1971.
Those who claim that this act is somehow perfectly aligned with the principles of democracy are doing a poor job of concealing the farce that they are propagating, and should be aware that their claims are little less than comical to any reader who is not challenged in the mental department.
If the elected representatives of a majority of those in interior Sindh, are to impose a system of governance upon Karachi, when the elected representatives of a majority of the population in Karachi are opposed to it - how by any stretch of the imagination would that act then fall within the accepted parameters of democratic norms???
If one is to still defend the legitimacy of this action by using the argument that it would not be feasible to administer a separate form of governance each time demands for it are risen from a certain locality, then it should be pointed out that - notwithstanding the inherently controversial nature of that argument - that the locality in question here which demands a separate form of governance (Karachi) comprises about 40% of the population of that of total administrative zone of the Government of Sindh (and almost the entirety of its economy - but of course, that is insignificant here), which is geographically easily distinguishable from the rest of administrative zone (the rest of Sindh), and the elected representatives of a majority of the population of that locality are demanding an alternative method of governance, and it is the only locality in Sindh that is doing so or has ever had the tendency to do so.
It would be a shame then if any one in Pakistan even dares to criticize something like, say, the subjugation of Kashmir by the Government of India, or of Palestine by the Government of Israel, without acknowledging the subjugation of Karachi (which has a greater population than both Kashmir and Palestine combined) by the Government of Sindh.
@ Munsif Ali , very right .................
The essence of democracy is that the majority should decide the outcome .
So as per your logic the Majority of Karachi rejected the so called Commissionary system , keep it in your Interior Sindh if the system is so good , we are literate enough to understand the pros and cons of this medieval manning system of the British Raj .
We are in majoirty in Karachi , so democratically speaking ,our say should prevail for Karachi .
The say of majority is principle of democracy.If members of provincial assembly adopt the 1979 local bodies system, they can and should do it because it's demand of people of Pakistan and it was also election promise of PPP.Therefore PPP should not get intimated by any act of violence by any quarter to stop this will of majority.