PPP govt serious about devolving powers to local agencies: LG minister

KARACHI : Sindh Information and Local Government Minister Syed Nasir Hussain Shah has said he personally has been in favour of empowering the local government institutions in the province to the maximum possible extent as per the law.

He stated this on Saturday while chairing a meeting of a subsidiary committee of the Sindh cabinet to devolve powers to the local government agencies in the province. The meeting was attended Education and Labour Minister Saeed Ghani, Law and Environment Adviser Barrister Murtaza Wahab, Karachi Administrator Laeeq Ahmed, Local Government Secretary Najam Shah and other officials. The local government minister said he had twice remained the nazim of the Sukkur district (in local government system during Pervez Musharraf’s regime), but the basic municipal functions of a city had never been available to the nazim in that set-up. He said the fulfillment of the municipal functions had remained the responsibility of the towns in the previous local government system. Shah claimed that the Sindh government was fully serious about devolving the powers to the level of the municipal agencies. He said legislation would be adopted to devolve the civic institutions of the Sindh Building Control Authority, the Sindh Solid Waste Management Board, and the Karachi Water & Sewerage Board to the regional level in the province. He said the committee in question had been tasked with preparing recommendations for devolving powers to the local governments, and the final decision to this effect would be taken at the topmost level of the provincial government.

The education and labour minister said objections were often raised by opposition political parties in the province that the authority and fiscal powers were not available to the municipal agencies in the province, but on the contrary the provincial government had been devolving the power to collect property tax to the local government agencies. He said a comprehensive draft of law had to be finalised for the devolution of powers, and for the purpose they were required to consult the political parties. The law and environment adviser said there was a need to improve the local government law in the province, and there was no cause to do the experimentation of adopting a new law in this regard.