ISLAMABAD / HYDERABAD / LAHORE(National Times)- Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi’s call for an overhaul of the country’s governance structure and the carving out of new administrative units has ignited an animated debate across the country, with the PPP referring the question to its top decision-making forum, the Sindh chief minister flatly rejecting it, Lahore’s lawyers terming it unconstitutional and Sindhi nationalist groups demanding the minister’s resignation.

Addressing the Pakistan Economic Summit in Islamabad on Thursday, Mr Naqvi said the present system of governance had collapsed and was fundamentally incapable of resolving the country’s problems.

He urged all political parties to sit together and settle every outstanding issue, including the creation of new units and provinces, warning that without structural change the same debates would be taking place a decade from now.

He described more administrative units as the only way to bring facilities closer to citizens, said new leadership was needed, and argued that the country’s youth wanted justice, merit and jobs rather than stipends and laptops.

PPP refers matter to CEC

The PPP’s Central Executive Com­mittee will take up the question of new administrative units, party secretary general Nayyar Bokhari told Dawn, while insisting that the route must be constitutional rather than executive.

Bokhari said the Constitution laid down a complete procedure, and that neither new provinces nor any change in provincial boundaries was possible without a two-thirds majority in the relevant provincial assembly, the National Assembly and the Senate. New provinces, he stressed, could not be brought about through an executive order. He said that if there was genuine seriousness about creating new provinces — South Punjab included — the matter should go to parliament and the constitutional requirements should be met.

Mr Bokhari called on Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, whose party governs Punjab and the Centre, to begin the process in his own province, recalling that a resolution for a South Punjab province was already pending before the Punjab Assembly.

Federal ministers, he said, should raise the issue in the cabinet and, once it was approved, Prime Minister Sheh­baz Sharif should consult PPP Chair­man Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on what he called an important national issue.

The CEC would then deliberate, with every decision taken in line with the Constitution, democracy and the will of the people.

Responding directly to the interior minister, Mr Bokhari said the proper forum for addressing flaws in the system was parliament rather than the me­dia, and asked who should be held responsible if the system was not working.

‘Sindh will not accept it’

Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah dismissed the proposal as a stereotype that the people of his province would never accept.

Speaking briefly to journalists at Bhit Shah on Friday, the chief minister said he had seen the minister’s remarks about the system having collapsed, but was unclear on what exactly Mr Naqvi was referring to.

He noted that Shehbaz Sharif was prime minister, that the PML-N governed Punjab, the PPP governed Sindh, a coalition ran Balochistan and the PTI controlled Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

“If he thinks that this system is beyond repair now then he should come up with some proposals,” Mr Shah said. The minister had offered several suggestions, he added, but this particular one — new administrative units or provinces — was “a stereotype which people of this mystic land will not accept”.

‘Unconstitutional’

The Lahore High Court Bar Assoc­ia­tion condemned the interior minister’s statement on changing the governance system, calling it unconstitutional.

In a joint statement, LHCBA Presi­dent Babar Murtaza, Vice President So­­­h­ail Qaiser Tarar and Finance Sec­retary Malik Ali Raza Khokhar said those responsible for the destruction of the existing order were now proposing a “new system”. The country’s progr­ess, survival and prosperity, they said, depended solely on strict adherence to the Constitution, the rule of law and complete independence of the judiciary.

They criticised the minister for in­­v­i­ting politicians to alter the governance system at a time when, they claimed, popular political leaders and workers had been jailed for prolonged periods on fabricated and baseless charges. The office-bearers demanded the im­­mediate release of all detained political workers and said state institutions and agencies must end their intervention so that constitutional supremacy and judicial freedom could be guaranteed.

Call for Naqvi’s resignation

Awami Tehreek leaders accused the interior minister of advocating the division of Sindh under the cover of creating new provinces, and demanded that he step down.

In a joint statement on Friday, party president Vasand Thari, secretary general Sajid Hussain Mahesar and other leaders said Mr Naqvi enjoyed the PPP’s backing and had, after the MQM and some media organisations, taken up the role of an undeclared spokesperson for the establishment in promoting the new provinces agenda. They said he had lost the moral and political justification to remain interior minister.