Mines dept problems be considered: Basharat

LAHORE:Provincial Minister for Law and Cooperatives Raja Basharat has directed the Mines and Minerals Development (MMD) Department secretary to make suggestions about the proposed legal amendments in consultation with all stakeholders and formulate a short and long term comprehensive business plan for the development of the department.

Chairing a meeting, Raja Basharat directed that further consideration be given to the department's problems and legal amendments in the next meeting to which the all stakeholders should also be invited.

The meeting was also attended by Provincial Minister for Mines Hafiz Ammar Yasir, Mines director general, industries additional secretary and other officers concerned. The MMD secretary briefed the meeting on the existing laws, proposed amendments and issues of the department.

The meeting considered the proposed legal amendments to improve the performance of the MMD Department. The meeting was informed that the law of 1928 prevailed at present which had fines and penalties at the old rate, therefore, increase in them was need of the hour.

The secretary said the delay in reports for licences by the Environment Department often increased the cost while leasing powers were vested in the deputy commissioners who did not hold meetings for a long time, thus, causing delay in the auction process of minerals. The secretary said that the department was facing severe shortage of staff and resources.

The old and damaged vehicles of the department are an obstacle to better performance of the department, the secretary said.

LGs stability: Political and social activists have said legislation should be enacted to give stability to the local governments for a fixed period of time. They demanded increase in women’s seats and end to separate electorate system.

They urged the political parties to include the local government as a subject in their political training. They expressed these views during a discussion session held here by Sangat Development Foundation.

The participants reviewed the situation after the recent Supreme Court decision regarding the local government and demanded early local government elections.

They marked Supreme Court decision good that allows the elected local government representatives to complete its term. They were of the view that local government institutions were different in the Punjab Local Government Act 2013 and Punjab Local Government Act 2019. There is lack of clarity, they said.

The participants included Zahid Islam, an expert on local governments, Bushra Khaliq from WISE, Muhammad Tahseen from SAP, Asma Aamir, program coordinator, SDF, Mubeen uddin Qazi, advocate, Supreme Court, Sumaira Abid, PTI, Kanwal Pervaiz Chaudhry, PML-N, Azhar Iqbal, JI, Barrister Mukhtar Ahmed Tatry, Pak Sir Zameen, Maqsood Hussain, Brabari Party, Nasir William, MQM and Naseem Kanwal, PML-Q.