The 55-year journey of LBs

LAHORE: Although local governments have existed in the Indian subcontinent since the setting up of the first municipal corporation in Madras in 1688 by the East India Company, the history and concept of local bodies in independent Pakistan dates back to October 26, 1959, when the then ruler Field Marshall Ayub Khan had introduced his “Basic Democracy” (BD) System, a special research conducted by the Jang Group/Geo Television Network reveals.
The primary responsibility of the BD members during Ayub’s reign was to oversee the judicial police and developmental functions pertaining to their areas.
The 80,000 BD representatives were soon given the right/power to elect the president and members of the Parliament.
On February 15, 1960, Ayub Khan had sought vote of confidence from the 80,000 BD members, of which 75,283 or 95.6 per cent had voted in favour of the military ruler at the helm of affairs.
Ayub Khan was thus sworn in as the first “elected” president.
The referendum’s question was, “Do you have confidence in the President Field Marshal Mohammed Ayub Khan?”
BD members had then proceeded to elect the representative of the people to National Assembly in April 1962 and to the provincial assembly in May 1962.
On June 8, 1962, Ayub Khan had imposed a new Constitution in the country, introducing a presidential form of government, with BD system being the basis of presidential election.
This charter had also provided for election of the president by 80,000 (later raised to 120,000) Basic Democrats—men who could theoretically make their own choice but who were essentially under the sitting ruler’s control and command!
The first session of the National Assembly elected in 1962 was held on June 8, 1962. Soon, it was obvious that there were political groupings in the assembly.
The constitution had failed to gain popular support of the people, but was the fundamental law of Pakistan from June 1962 until Martial Law was declared in March 1969.
On October 26, 1962, a politician Munim Khan was appointed governor of East Pakistan, but due to his undisputed loyalty with Ayub Khan, he became unpopular in East Pakistan and was viewed as a West Pakistan “agent” by many Bengalis. University students in Dhaka had showed their resentment in this context by refusing to receive their degrees from the governor.
On May 29, 1963, a Bengali member of parliament had delivered an aggressive speech in the National Assembly, whereby representing the sentiments of the Bengali people, highlighting the divide, exploitation and prejudice against Bengalis by West Pakistan.
In December, 1963, Ayub Khan had assumed the presidency of the Pakistan Muslim League and on January 2, 1965, extremely controversial presidential elections were held under the BD system.
Ayub was the Convention Muslim League’s presidential candidate for re-election.
Fatima Jinnah, supported surprisingly by Maulana Maudoodi-led Jamaat-e-Islami and other political entities forming the anti-Ayub Combined Opposition, had contested against Ayub Khan.
Although the name of General Azam Khan as a joint presidential candidate was also discussed, all major opposition leaders in both East and West Pakistan had finally announced unanimous support for Miss Jinnah on September 16 1964, more than three months before the polling.
Fatima Jinnah’s supporters had also included the likes of Khwaja Nazimuddin, Mian Mumtaz Khan Daultana, Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, Maulana Bashani, Wali Khan and Chaudhry Mohammad Ali etc.
The Election Commission was set up on October 21, 1964, with G Mueen al-Din as chief election commissioner and Justices M R Khan and Sardar Muhammad Iqbal as members.
Though the General had won the final honours with a 64 per cent vote, he had visibly lost against Miss Jinnah in Dhaka and Karachi.
Development on the local bodies’ front had remained quiet for over a decade before the Martial Law regime of General Zia had revived the system in 1979 under the provincial local government ordinances.
Under this ordinance, there were four levels of municipal government in the urban areas: town committees, municipal committees, municipal corporations and metropolitan corporations.
On September 29 1983, local bodies’ elections were again held during General Zia’s rule and on November 30, 1987, councilors were elected yet again to solve the local problems with the local resources.
Local bodies elections were also held in 1991, 1998, 2001 and 2005.
Basically, Pakistan had experienced with two systems of local government before General Pervez Musharraf’s Devolution Plan of August 14, 2000 was introduced through the Local Government Ordinance.
Under Musharraf’s Devolution Plan, a 33 per cent quota for women was introduced in local councils and 17 per cent seats were reserved for them in the legislative assemblies.
Consequently, the first local government election held under the Local Government Ordinance 2001 had brought 36,105 women councilors in the local government system.
Out of 36,066 seats reserved for women in 6,022 union councils, some 32, 222 were filled through direct election while 3,898 were allocated at the tehsil and district level through indirect mode of election.
However, through an amendment in the Local Government Ordinance, the overall number of local councilors at the union council was reduced from 21 to 13, which had negatively impacted on women’s numerical strength in the system that resultantly came down from 36,066 to 24,528.
The literature on the devolution and the local government was primarily produced by the National Reconstruction Bureau, which was established under General Naqvi to undertake the task of political, administrative and financial devolution.
Study reveals that some 99 years before partition, the Karachi Board of Conservancy was established in 1846, while the Municipal Act for Lahore and Rawalpindi was passed in 1867.
Research further shows that the 1907 Decentralisation Commission recommended the appointment of non-official chairmen of municipal committees, a recommendation which was endorsed and extended further by the 1925 Simon Commission set up to assess the performance of local self-government.
The 1935 government of India Act had allowed provincial autonomy and had permitted the provinces to frame legislation on local government systems?