After a roller-coaster series of events amid a tug-of-war between the ruling PPP and opposition MQM (backed by other opposition parties) over the issue of the new local government law and the upcoming local elections, the Sindh High Court declared on December 30 that the controversial Sindh Local Bodies Act of 2013 is “unconstitutional”.
“It is impossible to hold elections on the announced date because of the court verdict,” Election Commission official Ahmed Tanvir said. “The ballot papers have already been sent to the press with the existing delimitations.”
“The Sindh government will appeal against the verdict in the Supreme Court, and also go back on the negotiation table with the opposition parties,” Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah said.
[quote]When the MQM withdrew from the alliance, the PPP withdrew the law[/quote]
In a recent meeting in Larkana, former president and PPP co-chairman Asif Zardari had instructed the Sindh chief minister to negotiate with the MQM to resolve the matter.
Karachi and MQM progressed under Mustafa Kamal's stint as a mayor from 2005 to 2010
The local bodies elections had become controversial before they were held, especially in Karachi. After two successful local bodies elections in Sindh under General Musharraf’s Sindh Local Governments Ordinance of 2001, the PPP, after coming to power in 2008, said it wanted to change the law made by a dictator. Since then, the PPP and MQM have disagreed over changes to the law, even as allies.
In 2012, after successful negotiations, the two parties passed a Sindh People’s Local Government Ordinance, but it became controversial and led to a large Sindhi nationalist movement against PPP led by the PML-F, Sindh National Party and JASQM.
The Sindh chief minister is taking a stern anti-MQM approach
Other political developments soon after the promulgation of the new law broke down the PPP-led ruling coalition government. When the MQM withdrew from the alliance, the PPP withdrew the law. In the words of a senior minister in Sindh, “the PPP had passed the law only to please the MQM. We were all against it.”
After the general elections in May 2013, the PPP and the MQM formed core committees on local bodies and had been negotiating until August, when the PPP introduced the Local Government Bill of 2013 and passed it in the Sindh Assembly.
Nisar Khuhro
Nisar Khuhro conceded that the bill contained many features of the local bodies system of 1979. Prior to the local Bodies Ordinance of 1979, a local bodies system had been introduced during the era of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto that had also envisaged a Metropolitan Corporation in Karachi and other municipal institutions similar to the local government system of 1979.
MQM’s former parliamentary leader Syed Sardar Ahmed said the 2013 law was erroneous in nature as it did not properly state the reasons and objectives for presenting the legislation for consideration of the house. After the Sindh High Court judgment, the Election Commission of Pakistan has also tipped at delaying the elections. “The PPP is making a new strategy, and will go to the Supreme Court,” Sindh Local Bodies Minister Sharjeel Memon said.
The situation had become tense when the PPP increased pressure on MQM following a law-enforcement operation in Karachi, and its senior minister Manzoor Wassan spoke of a PPP mayor in Karachi for the first time in history.
“All political parties have a right to contest elections. Why can’t there be a jiyala mayor in Karachi if the people vote for him?” Wassan said in response to criticism of his statement.
According to Najeeb Ahmed, who has worked on drafting the law, “The newly inducted controversial local bodies bill divided Karachi and Hyderabad into controversial constituencies that would favor the ruling party.”
The local government law is very important for the MQM. The party first came to power in Karachi via local bodies elections in 1986, with Dr Farooq Sattar becoming the mayor of Karachi and Aftab Sheikh the mayor of Hyderabad. The party fundamentally sees local bodies elections as game changer. “We have more competent people than the number of seats we win, and the local governments help us adjust them in the local set-up for local empowerment,” an MQM leader said. In Mustafa Kamal’s stint as Nazim of Karachi from 2005 to 2010, the MQM progressed as a political party also became more popular.
The party has recently announced its local government manifesto and candidates in Karachi. Its candidates for mayor may include former MNA Khushbakht Shujaat and another member of MQM’s central coordination committee.
As the court strikes down the law as unconstitutional, the PPP says it will go back to the negotiations table
The MQM is also criticizing the recently started law-enforcement operation in Karachi, and says it is being targeted in a way that would hurt its local election campaign.
But with Owais Muzaffar losing his grip over the affairs of Sindh, the hawkish chief minister Qaim Ali Shah has been taking a sterner anti-MQM approach. “The PML-N uses MQM, and the PPP uses MQM, and MQM is ready to be used, so it’s fair game,” a PPP leader said.
