The Sindh Assembly on Monday approved Sindh People’s Local Government Ordinance (SPLGO) 2012 amid protest by a handful member of opposition parties in the house.
The bill was tabled by provincial law minister Ayaz Sumro and the lawmakers approved it clause by clause by raising their hands. The majority of 149 Sindh Assembly MPAs supported the bill while 18 members belonging to Pakistan Muslim League-Functional-(PML-F), National People’s Party (NPP), Pakistan Muslim League-Q and Awami National Party (ANP) opposed it and tore apart copies of the bill.
They staged sit-in against non-allotment of seats on the opposition benches and Sindh People’s Local Government ordinance (SPLGO).
Members from PML-F, ANP and PML-Q sat down in front of Speaker Nisar Khohro’s rostrum. They chanted slogans against the ordinance and demanded that opposition benches be issued to them as they have tendered resignations.
Jam Madad Ali, PML-F’s leader of the opposition, said resignations of the opposition members were sent to the chief minister ten days back, but they had not so far been sent to governor Sindh for approval.
To which Sindh Information Minister Sharjeel Memon said the opposition members should have directly send the resignations to governor Sindh.
PPP leader and Sindh Education Minister, Pir Mazhar Ul-Haq, said copies of the resignations had been sent to governor Sindh for approval.
The speaker kept shouting “order, order” during the chaos as opposition members continued interrupting him during the assembly proceeding.
They chanted slogans against the new local government ordinance and criticized the speaker for not allotting them seats on opposition benches.
Sindhi nationalists observed strike against the SPLGO. They termed the SPLGO a conspiracy to divide Sindh.
Meanwhile a strike was observed in most part of Sindh on Monday over a call given by nationalist parties’ alliance, Sindh Bachao Committee, against new local body system which they describe as division of the province.
Owing to the wheel-jam and shutter down strike, vehicular traffic remained sparse on the roads in Sindh interior, with markets, shops and most educational institutes closed.
The strike call did not affect Karachi.
The nationalists parties have also hold rallies, sit-ins and observing token hunger strike during the strike today.