Daily Times

ISLAMABAD – Federal Capital Islamabad is all set to emerge as a metropolitan corporation for the first time since its inception five and a half decades ago, with the inception of local government elections going to be held on November 30.

Either, these were the local government elections under the previous systems or the polls under the system introduced by military regime in early years of present century, the federal capital remained an administrative territory without any body of elected representatives from the grassroots.

It was only in 1993, when for the first time local government elections were held in rural areas of the Islamabad district, but the city areas could not have a district council or metropolitan corporation on the basis of local government to represent the people in the area.

Therefore, around over a million people remained deprived of the local level representation for resolution of their problems over the years. Though, there had been certain civic bodies to meet the needs of the people living in the capital, yet their representation in the power institutions remained specified to MNAs and Senators.

The present government broke the ice and went for a bold initiative to put in place a local government system, in a city where bureaucrats ruled unclaimed over the decades. So now the capital is all poised for a system representative of the people as 676795 registered voters will be provided an opportunity to exercise their right to vote on November 30 to elect local level representatives in 50 union councils of the Islamabad district.

In each union council, voters will elect 13 representatives including a chairman, a vice chairman, six general members, two women members, one labor member, one youth member and one non-Muslim member. The chairman and vice chairman in each union council would form a panel and will have to be collectively elected by securing votes from each polling station of the respective union councils. There would be six seats of general members for which each union council has been divided into six wards. One member shall be elected from one ward.

It is mention worthy that although union council members other than chairmen would not be eligible to vote in metropolitan elections, but any elected member of the union councils would be eligible to contest the election of mayor and deputy mayor.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has set the limit of expenditures to Rs 100,000 for chairman and deputy chairman of the union council and Rs 30,000 for candidates contesting on each general seat and those reserved for women, non-Muslims and laborers.

The ECP has also appointed 10 returning officers (ROs) for the conduct of elections and has also decided deployment of Army personnel and Rangers on the polling day to ensure peace and security in the capital.