Municipal Council...Well-Established Experience Enhances Participation in Development Process
Doha, June 12 (QNA) - The Central Municipal Council is the first house of democracy in the State of Qatar, and the culmination of municipal work that went through several stages and witnessed continuous development over the last three decades of the twentieth century. The municipal work was strengthened when the first municipal elections was held in 1999.
The first municipal council appeared in the early 1950s and in later years the laws and regulations regulating the municipalities and the municipal council have undergone various stages of development and update, including Law No. 11 of 1963 (amended by a law issued in 1972) regulating the Doha municipality and stipulating the formation of its municipal council of 19 members for two years.
The establishment of a ministry specialized in municipal affairs in 1972 constituted a new shift in terms of developing municipal work, along with the issuance of laws related to the administrative divisions of the state, the naming of municipalities, and the formation of a municipal council for each municipality separately.
The year 1990 witnessed an important shift represented in the abandonment of these councils and the establishment of a single central municipal council for all municipalities. A law issued in 1990 regulated this transformation, and stipulated that the council comprises 29 elected members for a period of three years.
In 1998, the State of Qatar recorded an important leap in this field, represented by the issuance of a law on the election of the members of the Central Municipal Council by direct secret ballot system, in addition to raising the number of members to 29, representing different areas.
According to the mechanism specified by the law, the 29 members of the Council are elected from among several candidates, one for each electoral districts. The term of the Council shall be four years commencing from the date of its first meeting. During the last four months of that term elections for the new council shall take place.
During the past two decades, six municipal elections were held in the State of Qatar, amidst a large participation of citizens in the candidacy and election process, both male and female, while the country is currently preparing to host the 7th session of the elections, scheduled for June 22.
The elections for the first session of the Central Municipal Council members were organized on March 8, 1999, and contested by 84 candidates, including one woman. The second elections were held on April 7, 2003, in which 84 candidates, including three women, competed. Municipal elections were held for the third time in April 2007, in which 116 candidates, including three women, competed.
The elections for the fourth term were held on May 10, 2011, in which 79 candidates competed, including four women. The fifth term was held on May 13, 2015, with 110 candidates, including five women, while the sixth elections were organized on April 16, 2019, including five women as well.
In Decree No. 17 of 1998, the Qatari legislator assigned the task of organizing the elections for the members of the Central Municipal Council to the Ministry of the Interior, where more than 15 specialized departments from the Ministry's departments cooperate in organizing, preparing and following up the elections of the Council.
A number of other authorities in the country cooperate with the Ministry of the Interior in managing the electoral process, especially the Ministry of Education and Higher Education, the Supreme Judiciary Council, and the Ministry of Municipality, all of which have played an important and prominent role in the success of the electoral process.
The Qatari legislator has made the Council independent and its budget attached to the general budget of the State. It has also given its members complete freedom in expressing their opinions and suggestions in accordance with the specific competencies of the Council.
According to the law, the Council aims to work with the means available on the progress of the country in the field of municipal affairs, and has in order to achieve its objectives to exercise in particular the specializations, powers, and responsibilities, including the monitoring of the implementation of laws, resolutions, and regulations relating to the powers and competences of the ministry and the council, including laws, resolutions, and regulations related to the affairs of building regulation, land planning, roads, shops, industrial, public and other regulations in which it provides for the authorization of the council has the authority to monitor the execution.
The Council is also concerned with the research in the areas of planning and programs, economic, social, financial and administrative for municipal and agricultural affairs, especially the following: study of the desires or proposals submitted by members of the Council on any issue that comes in the areas of municipal and agricultural affairs; Consider and express opinions on issues and issues related to municipal affairs that are referred to the Council by the Ministry or other government agencies; Make recommendations regarding issuing laws or taking any procedures or measures that the Council deems necessary or beneficial to the public interest.
The Central Municipal Council examines petitions and complaints related to municipal and agricultural affairs, monitors the implementation of laws and regulations for foods intended for human consumption, proposes the establishment of public parks and follow up on their maintenance, monitors the implementation of laws and regulations for cleaning streets and roads and collecting and disposing of waste and dirt, oversees public transportation of passengers, and monitors the implementation of the laws of commercial licenses, hotels, entertainment places, parks, simple occupations, and street vendors.
The Council's competence is also monitoring the implementation of advertising license laws and prevent public inconvenience, proposing the names given to cities, villages, neighborhoods, streets, squares, markets, and parks, monitoring and regulating the regulations for markets and shops, and other specializations specified by the law.
During the previous six sessions, the Council succeeded in keeping pace with the comprehensive development renaissance, and made more than 600 recommendations covering all sectors that fall within the core of the Council's competencies defined by the law.
The Central Municipal Council is affiliated with a number of committees, including the Coordination and Follow-up Committee, which was formed pursuant to a Cabinet decision. The committee is concerned with organizing, coordinating and following up the work between the Council, ministries, other government entities, and public bodies and institutions, and includes five representatives of the Council, as well as representatives of a number of ministries and government institutions.
The committee is also concerned with expressing opinions on issues of common interest that fall within the competence of the Central Municipal Council with other government entities, and facilitating its access to information, studies and reports related to its competencies from ministries and other agencies.
The committee is also responsible for following up the decisions and recommendations issued by the Central Municipal Council and coordinating between it and other ministries and government agencies in studying issues of common interest.
The stages that municipal work has gone through and its development mechanisms over the past decades, which were established in 1999 through the ballot boxes, reflect the State's keenness to enhance popular participation and provide opportunities for men and women to make developmental transformations and build modern Qatar. (QNA)
