Re-marking calendars: Local bodies’ polls in K-P rescheduled to June

Fourth attempt by the government to hold elections.

PESHAWAR:

Local government polls have been rescheduled for the first week of June, announced Minister for Local Government Inayatullah Khan on Wednesday.

Speaking to journalists at Peshawar Press Club during guest hour, Khan said the schedule for the polls would be released in April.

Last week, provincial government representatives said local bodies’ elections in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) would be held by May 2015.

Massive undertaking

Khan said the election will take place on 3,179 seats.

“Of these, 1,546 will be district council seats while 1,633 will be tehsil council seats,” he said. “A total 1,017 general seats and 529 reserve seats will be allocated at the district level.” Meanwhile, 1,017 general seats and 616 reserve seats have been allocated at the tehsil level.

On the pending tray

“This is the first time in Pakistan’s history that political parties will conduct local government elections under a democracy and devolve powers to the grass-roots level,” Khan said. “This time the polls will be organised under democratic rule. In 2005, local bodies’ elections were held during the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) government while the country was being ruled by General (retd) Pervez Musharraf.”

Fourth time’s the charm

According to the senior minister, this is the fourth attempt by the current provincial government to hold local government polls. “Unlike our previous attempts, this attempt has been far more successful,” he said.



Khan said both Jamaat-e-Islami and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had vowed to hold local government elections under the manifestoes of the general elections in 2013.

“When they came into power, the coalition partners formed a subcommittee to chalk out a viable plan to hold the local bodies’ polls,” he said. “However, elections were postponed due to delays in delimitation process in Punjab and Sindh. Otherwise, we would have held them earlier.”

Khan maintained Chief Minister Pervez Khattak had met the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) chief two months ago to persuade him to hold polls under a biometric voting system (BVS) in K-P.

“However, the government was told that if they want to conduct elections under a biometric system, they would have to wait until December 2015.”

Earlier, on October 24, 2014, the PTI government sent a formal request to the ECP to hold local government elections in the province. Two days later, the K-P government asked the ECP to announce the poll schedule. After much back and forth over the feasibility to use new and costly technology across the province, the government decided in November 2014 to go ahead with the polls without the BVS.

Following the 18th Amendment adopted in 2010, the subject of local governments was devolved to provinces. As a result, they have the power to adopt any system of their choice for local governments while the ECP’s role is limited to just supervising the polls.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 12^th, 2015.