Balochistan govt abolishes local councils

QUETTA: The government of Balochistan has put an end to all the local councils, district and city governments, tehsil and town councils, with immediate effect. Those councils were established by former president Pervez Musharraf under the Local Government Ordinance 2001, which has now been abolished.

Instead it has now been replaced with the Local Government Act, 2010. According to the new law, the local councils in the rural areas and the district councils have been established or retained, while the local councils in cities and urban centres have been abolished with immediate effect.

There will be one metropolitan corporation, 45 municipal committees, and 30 district councils, while all the union councils, excluding the cities and major townships, remain intact and other municipal and local bodies, including district or city governments stood dissolved. All the assets, staff, liabilities of the concerned institutions will be transferred accordingly.

There will be a fresh delimitation of wards prior to holding municipal elections in the urban areas of Balochistan.

On the orders from the chief ministers, municipal committees and town committees had been revived, while Quetta has again been given the status of a Metropolitan Corporation.

It may be mentioned that the towns named Chiltan and Zargoon earlier fought an unending legal battle in superior courts seeking control of assets. They engaged costly lawyers at the expense of the public exchequer, in fighting the legal battle. With the abolition of the town committees in Quetta, the costly legal battle in superior courts has automatically been ended.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 28^th, 2010.