Petition against SPLGO: SHC asks respondents to submit replies by Thursday

Petitioner maintains that ordinance can not overrule an Act passed by the assembly.

HYDERABAD: The Sindh Peoples Local Government Ordinance 2012 has been challenged in the Sindh High Court Hyderabad circuit bench by advocate Mumtaz Lashari, who termed it as an ‘encroachment’ on the Sindh Local Government Amended Act, 2011.

The bench of Justice Muhammad Tasnim and Justice Habibur Rehman Shaikh heard the petition asking the court to strike down the ordinance.

The petitioner maintained that the new ordinance is a continuation of the Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2011 which lapsed in November 2011. He recalled that the ordinance was not legislated by the Sindh Assembly.

“An ordinance can not overrule the sanctity of an Act passed by the assembly,” Lashari argued in his petition. In support of his argument, he cited the repeal of the local government system of 2001 by an overwhelming majority in the Sindh Assembly in 2011.

The SHC issued notices on Tuesday to the respondents, including the federal government, Sindh chief secretary, secretaries of the local government and law departments, to submit a reply by October 4. The plea to issue a stay against the implementation of the ordinance, however, was not granted.

The promulgation of the SPLGO 2012 on September 7 has been receiving backlash from different political parties and organisations. Nine elected representatives from allied parties resigned in protest of the ordinance while the Sindhi nationalists called for protests against it.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 28^th, 2012.