ISLAMABAD - Although the local bodies is entirely a provincial subject the divergent views of provinces on its future setup have compelled the federal government to play role in thrashing out differences among the provinces so that a uniform system of governance at grass-root level can be installed across the country. Since the PPP-led coalition government wants a uniform local bodies system across the country, Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani was busy negotiating with provinces in this connection, a PPP leader informed The Nation. The official version of PPP government is that since local bodies is purely a provincial subject, it is up to the provinces to decide that which form of local bodies set-up suits them and when to hold the elections. However, the background interviews with the PPP leaders and sources in the government divulged to The Nation that both President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani are taking keen interest in the fate and future of local bodies elections as being the coalition partner in all the four provinces PPP has high stakes in it. The PPP leaders say apparently these elections were delayed in all the four provinces due to the unprecedented floods, which had affected parts of almost all the four provinces, but the real story behind the undue delay in local bodies elections was the sharp differences of parties on future set-up and time for the elections. Sources said Mr Gilani had talked with almost all the major political parties in the Parliament but could not bring them at one platform. These sources said that keeping in view the stiff stand of some of the political parties on the subject, Mr Gilani was contemplating on taking this issue to Council of Common Interests so that the provincial leadership could sit together and thrash out differences. So far Muttahdia Qaumi Movement is the only political party, which wanted the District Government System, introduced by Gen. Pervez Musharraf, intact in the province while the other main stakeholders in the province, Sindh PPP and ANP, were in favour of reverting back to the old system of municipal corporations in the province. Both MQM and PPP Sindh were sticking to their guns on the issue and PPP Co-Chairman President Asif Ali Zardari was perplexed over what to do. In Punjab, the government had restored Magistracy System and was in the process of coming up with proper legislation so that a new Local Bodies set-up could be given to the province which would likely be amalgamation of the District Government and old municipality systems. More or less Balochsitan and Khyber-Pakhtoonkhawa also wanted to revert back to the old Local Bodies system but no significant progress was made in this regard. Sources said although President and Prime Minister has termed current year as Local Bodies elections year but the fact of the matter is that these elections could not be held up till next year, as so far none of the province had completed the legislation on the future set-up of the local bodies.