QUETTA: Chairmen of various local councils and councillors staged a noisy demonstration outside the Balochistan Assembly demanding transfer of power and resources to the local Government institutions making it functional in an effective manner.

It was a token demonstration opposing the highly centralized powers to the Government in Quetta leaving the fate of local councils and their chosen representatives at the mercy of senior bureaucrats or Secretary of the Local Government Department.

One of the significant slogans that attracted the attention of the people present on the occasion that “MPAs should legislate or frame laws and stop building gutters misusing their MPA development funds. They publicly challenged the right of the MPAs performing the role of economic managers preparing development plans and himself implementing those plans without being qualified for the job.

Interestingly there strong liking and disliking for the institution of local Government by the so called elected Governments of various political parties and the military dictators who grabbed powers under the threat to use of force and toppled down successive Governments in Pakistan in military coup.

The military dictators loved the institutions of Local Government considering it parallel to the Federal or Provincial Parliament not challenging the right of the military dictators to rule this country. For this simple reasons, the institutions of local Government were given favour and support during the autocratic military rule.

The Parliament and the elected Provincial Assemblies challenge the right of an individual in uniform to rule the country under the extra-ordinary laws imposed on the people. Most of the military dictators always used the local councils as a prime institution or an Electoral College to elect the President with unlimited powers. Just to mislead the public opinion it was given the name of ‘basic democracy’ the idea coined by sycophant bureaucrats at an higher level to please the dictator.

Or the local councils were used in legitimizing the military takeover or military rule by holding referendum off and on. Thus the local councils got prime importance in the eyes of military dictators. That was why the councillors were always appeased by the military dictators without any hesitation.

On the contrary, the elected Government of any party had always shown a deep contempt towards the local councils seeking legitimate powers to run the affairs of people at the local level. The parties in power had shown deep contempt to idea of sharing powers with the local councils at any level.

The main political parties that ruled the country were found resisting the devolution of power and sharing powers between the Provincial Assemblies and the local councils. There was a bitter reaction on the part of the most ministers in the past PPP-led Coalition Government in Balochistan opposing devolution of powers to the lowest level or reducing the powers of the Provincial Assembly or the MPAs at any cost. Ministers from the religious parties were on forefront to resist sharing of powers with local council. They were denied fund or failed to form Provincial Finance Commission in this context.

The so-called democratic parties of the ruling coalition Government were found opposing all the moves, laws and steps to empower the local councils or transfer powers to the grassroots level which is the basic spirit of the representative democracy.

All the laws had been framed by the experts under the strong influence of the top bureaucracy in the provinces, including Balochistan. The top bureaucrat, the Secretary Local Government, retained the effective administrative control on all the local councils, including the Metropolitan Corporation of Quetta and the elected Mayor had been made subservient to the Grade 20 officer by design.

On the financial matter, the Provincial Finance Secretary had been made the real boss to regulate the finances of the local Government institutions, including the Metropolitan Corporation of Quetta.

For this specific reason, the Mayor and other representatives of the local councils at different level had been making demands from the Provincial Government run by the Secretaries of the Administrative Department who are, in fact, body and soul and any Government in Balochistan.

Balochistan is huge landmass and almost half of Pakistan in terms of territory and it is virtually difficult to govern it in an effective manner without sharing powers with the chosen representatives at the local level.

There is growing complaints in recent years that schools are ghosts, teachers and doctors are absconding from their duty and it is impossible for the Secretary of Education or Secretary of Health to regulate and ensure presence of Government employees to perform their duties in the remote regions. There is no other option but to devolve powers to the lowest level.

It is the institutions of the local Government available which should be empowered to govern all the Government institutions through the chosen representatives of the people at grassroots level. It is impossible to administer a school or a Government dispensary more than a 1000-mile away from the seat of Government in Quetta.

Balochistan needs effective devolution of power with developing a mechanism to introduce the accountability process from within and without minimum interference from the Provincial Government.

The Government should remove the administrative and financial control over the local bodies in order to allow the people to self rule and performance of the chosen representatives should be judged through their service to the people or their constituents.