K-P local councils plan all-party confab

President Himayatullah Mayar unveils protest plan outside provincial assembly

PESHAWAR:

The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Local Councils Association has decided to hold an all parties conference in Peshawar on February 14 to develop consensus on problems faced by the local bodies due to lack of funds and administrative powers.

The provincial leadership of all parties including Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf will be invited and the problems of local governments will be presented to them and full cooperation will be requested.

An important meeting of the Local Councils Association was held in Peshawar on Tuesday chaired by its President Himayatullah Mayar.

The meeting was attended by mayors and tehsil chairmen from across the province.

The problems of LGs were discussed in detail at the meeting.

Mayar, said that on the occasion of the Peshawar sit-in on January 1, the negotiation committee of the provincial government comprising of Local Government Minister Arshad Ayub Khan, Education Minister Faisal Tarkai, Revenue Minister Nazir Abbasi, Special Assistant Rangiz Khan, had promised to resolve the demands within 20 days and within a week a meeting with the chief minister K-P was to be arranged.

He further said that even after a month, the problems have not been resolved, nor has a meeting been held with the Chief Minister.

The provincial government is not showing seriousness in solving the problems of the LGs including provision of powers and funds, he maintained.

He said that the provincial government is not fulfilling its promises as recently the Cabinet approved Rs5 lakh for each village and neighborhood councils in the merged districts and MPAs and MNAs have been included in the committees instead of LG representatives.

Mayar announced the meeting's declaration and released the details of the decisions made.

According to the unanimous decision of the Local Councils Association, letters will be sent to the government ministers involved in the negotiations during the Peshawar protest urging them to fulfill the promises within seven days, otherwise, on 11 February, meetings of 131 tehsils of K-P will be held and a full protest will be recorded.