Sajjad Agha
Local bodies are known as root of democracy. If we look around and check the system of the developed countries there they have strong Local Bodies system.
They have devolved the powers to the grass root level. The main aim and objective of local bodies is to resolve the problems at the door steps of the public. It’s not the work of Members of Provincial assemblies, National assemblies and senate to resolve the problems of the people and provide the basic necessities.
Here in Pakistan unfortunately the local bodies are strengthen by the dictators in their era of rule and are weakened by the democratic rulers. Balochistan coalition Government took the credit of holding the Local Bodies elections earlier than other provinces as other provinces have held the elections on the orders of Supreme Court. In majority of districts of Punjab and Sindh the process of election of mayor is not completed yet.
Read also: Challenges for Local Bodies in Balochistan
In Balochistan majority of the Chairman of Municipal Corporations and District councils belong to ruling coalition partners. Still, they have protested several times against the provincial government for lack of their powers. They have even threatened the government with mass resignations. They are having the seat with no financial, Administrative and legal powers which they should have in an ideal situation.
We can guess the level of independence that even for cleaning of the Quetta city mayor requests the chief minister than he grants some budget as he did recently. It works for some time period when it finished then again Quetta shows its old picture.
The situation of Quetta after rainfalls was an example of the failure of the Local Bodies system. Roads were showing the landscape of rivers, sewerage lines were blocked, water entered into the houses. These all problems can only be countered when there is an effective and power based local bodies system. Local bodies can be hold accountable easily because they are elected at grass root level. Their constituency is limited they can easily be made answerable and they know the problems well as compared to members of provincial and national assemblies.
In recent budget high amount of funds are allocated for local bodies. It’s hoped that these funds are also released on time. At the same time check and balance on utilization of these funds is also necessary to ensure transparency and relief to the people.
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