Peshawar
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Local Government and Rural Development Faisal Amin Gandapur has said that holding transparent and impartial local bodies elections in 17 districts of the province including 3 merged districts in a transparent and impartial manner with certain essential reforms is historical achievement of the present PTI led provincial government.
“We have taken a number of fundamental measures that are based on our national dignity, country’s security and public welfare while we will also eliminate the scourge of inflation and unemployment from the country”, he added.
He was talking to various delegations including that of elite and local journalists at his Hujra in Dera Ismail Khan. On this occasion, he listened to the problems and grievances of the people patiently and issued instructions to the concerned authorities on the spot on many of their applications.
Expressing views on the LG elections, the Minister said that the PTI led KP government has the credit for holding the local bodies elections in both of our provincial government terms and also gave them collosal funds.
“It is a sign of opposition parties’ lack of interest in the local government system that local bodies elections are being avoided in Sindh despite repeated orders of the apex Court”, he maintained. He said that Prime Minister Imran Khan and Chief Minister KP Mehmood Khan have been very serious from day one about devolution of powers and that is why the provincial government not only fulfilled its promise of local bodies elections but also introduced certain essential and fundamental reforms.
In addition, he said, the chances of horse trading in the elections of city mayors and tehsil chairmen have also been eliminated, which is a great development, he asserted.
“We will now carry out the task of holding local bodies elections in all the other districts of the province as soon as possible so that the basic problems of the people can be solved at the local level that was started by the PTI led KP government in its previous term”, he reminded.
Faisal Amin Gandapur while rejecting the opposition’s claim regarding the defeat of PTI in the local bodies elections, clarified that the reason for low turnout in these elections was that more than one party candidates were contesting the elections on one seat.
He said that local body elections are contested on the basis of regional issues, community, families and personal influence so their results do not affect the popularity of any party or national and provincial level elections.
Responding to a question, the provincial minister said that the rumors of rigging by the opposition parties were baseless and based on lies. If the provincial government had influenced the elections, how could the opposition candidates have been successful?, he queried. The people have also seen this false propaganda of the opposition, he clarified. Referring to the KP government’s keen interest in the early launch of the LG system, Faisal Amin Gandapur said that the LG department had completed the most difficult phase of delimitation in the province several months before the elections, including all the merged districts, on which the Election Commission had also expressed satisfaction, he added. He said that in the recent local body elections like in the past, there have been complaints of slowness in the election process and disappearance of election seals and ballot papers, besides sporadic incidents of fights and skirmishes in polling stations have also came to light. The main reason for this, he said, is the old and outdated procedure of holding elections and the only solution is the use of technology in shape of electronic voting machine under the new legislation of the parliament. Hence in the next general election, he said, the PTI government will fulfill its promise to make the election peaceful whily rigging, Chamak and horse trading become stories of the past forever. Even the deads will not be able to cast votes, he ridiculed.
In response to a question, the Minister for Local Government clarified that we want the continuation of democracy in the country at all costs. He said that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has made favorable political environment and best arrangements for the elections. “We have always put political interests below the high interests of the country and the people, and the people are the best judge of the difference between good and bad. So in the next general election the wishful thinking of the opposition will vanish naturally, added.
“Victory will be the destiny of PTI in next general elections too and we will start a new golden era of national politics by forming strong governments not only in the federation but in all the provinces with a huge majority”, he concluded
