VC chairmen demand rules to begin working

PESHAWAR: Office-bearers of All Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Village Council Chairmen Association have asked the local government department to immediately frame rules and regulations for the village councils and activate the offices in all village councils.

Addressing a news conference at Peshawar Press Club on Monday, the office-bearers including Mehfuz ur Rehman, Junaid Qureshi, Siraj, Ijaz Khan and Daud said that the establishment of offices would help the elected councillors to solve people’s problems at their doorsteps.

They said the representatives elected in the first phase of local government elections on December 19 were still at the mercy of bureaucracy. The office-bearers said the elected representatives were helpless despite the fact that the second phase of local government elections had been completed.

They recalled that the provincial government had promised the people to devolve powers at the grassroots level but the rulers were using delaying tactics to empower the elected representatives at the local level.

On the other hand, the office-bearers said those who had elected local representatives had been disappointed. They said the delaying tactics of bureaucracy and the non-availability of proper rules were adding to people’s problems.