Daily Times

PESHAWAR: In order to give more power to tehsil and district councils, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) led-government in KP constituted a 12 member committee, to prepare a proposal of recommendations to extend the volume of the power of the Councils from 30 to 50 percent. However, the draft of recommendations to empower local bodies, which is yet to be finalised by the government appointed committee is also subject to approval from PTI chairman Imran Khan and Chief Minister Pervez Khattak.

The KP government was the second to hold local bodies polls in the country after Balochistan, but the process of power devolution to district and tehsil councils in the course of one year seems to have stopped in its tracks unless PTI chief Imran Khan to give the issue a hard look. According to sources, that recommendation had proclaimed that it was expedient to devolve political power and decentralise administration and financial authority to local governments for good governance, effective delivery of services and transparent decision-making through institutionalized participation of the people as per the spirit of the PTI motto.

The overall volume of the power of the district and tehsil councils has been extended under the proposed recommendation from 30 to 50 percent which is great push in power devolution process since the inception of the system in the province. The recommendation, which will give adequate share to district and tehsil councils and allowed both councils to exercise their power in district administration and finance.

According to the source the already dedicated 20 percent fund for education and 10 percent for health in the district would not be decreased or deducted by district and tehsil council. The head of the District Development Committee and other constituted committees will be District Nazim instead of Deputy Commissioner. Similarly, Tehsil Nazim will replace Assistant Commissioner (AC) in same way.

The dedicated fund for Town or Tehsil council municipal services and Water Supply & Sanitation would be neither deducted nor be reduced.

The source also said that one of hotly-debated clauses of the draft, which was discarded later, discussed community participation in utilising the fund of Project Committee for Union council, Neighborhood and Muhalla council. Finally, the community would have no say in utilising Rs; 1.5 million fund used by union councils, neighborhood and Muhalla Council for different developmental works. It is pertinent to mention here that in successive local governments in KP, the community had been given adequate representation for undertaking and overseeing community level developmental works and projects.

The Project Committee according to the spirit of recommendation will not be entitled to float tenders prior to launching any developmental works and the government shall be obliged to transfer the required fund directly into the committee account.

The process of drafting proposal of recommendation is in progress among the committee members which will be eventually completed in a few weeks, the important move is to take these recommendations on board and initiate meaningful power devolution process to district and tehsil councils for the long term.