SANGLA HILL-Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf has criticised the Punjab government for its decision regarding hold Local Government elections on non-party basis.
PTI Punjab Information Secretary Malik Azam termed that holding LG polls on non-party basis was a revival of the dictatorial legacies of Zia and Musharraf.
He was addressing an Eid milan party of the party workers which was attended by former Nazims, councillors, office-bearers and candidates of upcoming LB elections here the other day.
“Instead of strengthening the democratic norms at grassroots level, the PML-N is undermining the roots of democracy”. What is the fear in the minds of the PML-N, Malik Azam wondered?” That they would be exposed at the grassroots level for lack of support or capacity to deliver or both?
He said that the PTI strongly believed that a democratic culture was only as strong as its roots; and, by having non-party elections at the level of local government, the PML-N was undermining a democratic electoral culture where people were trained in party politics comprising ideological commitment and discipline from the village to the national level.
Malik Azam also pointed out that the PTI felt it was wrong to increase the eligibility age for candidates to 25 years for LG polls. Instead younger community workers and political activists should have been allowed to have access to contesting elections and learning the political dos and don’ts so that by 25-years of age they would have been trained in a strong democratic culture and been better equipped to serve the nation at the provincial and national level.
Malik concluded that the PML-N seemed determined to revive the dictatorial legacies of the past in the Punjab by framing a non-party LG model for the province. “Through a ‘tyranny of the majority’ they can force the implementation of this model, thereby again reviving the tyranical legacies of past dictatorships.  PTI Nankana Sahib District President Chaudhary Mutsafa Ali Sandhu, former Nazim Mudaser Aziz, former Nazim Dr Javaid Iqbal and TBA joint secretary Rashid Ali Rashid Guman were also present on the occasion.