KARACHI, May 26: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement on Thursday unfolded 200 development schemes, costing rupees one billion, for providing relief to the citizens while accusing the Karachi City District government of squandering public money and carrying out 95 per cent of the development work illegally and failing to provide relief to the people.
This was stated by the parliamentary leader of the MQM in the National Assembly, Dr Farooq Sattar, at a news conference which he addressed at Nine-Zero along with some MNAs of the party.
As the next local government elections were apparently not very far, the thrust of Dr Sattar’s press conference was on local issues and development projects affecting the people.
Dr Farooq Sattar referred to a seven-point agenda of General Pervez Musharraf which he had unfolded after Oct 12, 1999, military takeover and which had envisaged devolution of power to the people at the grass-root level.
He pointed out that while power to the local government under the local government laws was devolved to the lower tier from the provinces, the devolution of power between Centre and the province was still a big question mark. He was of the view that Karachi was unfortunate in the sense that despite devolution of power, genuine participation of the people in the system was not truly reflected and the civic responsibility passed on to those elements who neither had any understanding of the problems of the people of this city nor had any sympathy with the people.
Those who got between five to seven per cent votes had become master of the city but as they had no roots among the people, they remained oblivious to the problems of the people. As a result of that, he claimed, problems of the people piled up in the offices of MQM MNAs and MPAs.
He pointed out that during the past three years, no development work for the welfare of the people was undertaken but this year, some projects were started but they also suffered from gross mismanagement and lacked imaginative planning.
He referred to digging of many main roads of the city almost simultaneously which created massive traffic dislocation and caused great inconvenience to the people at large. Many sick people could not reach hospitals in time and died on the way in the traffic jams caused by such unimaginative execution of development works.
Dr Farooq Sattar alleged that 95 per cent of the development work initiated by the City District Government was done illegally. He pointed out that under the SLGO city council’s approval for the projects costing a certain amount was mandatory but the CDGK on its own launched many programmes, without prior approval of the city council.
He criticized such an approach and said it was unconstitutional, illegal and undemocratic and demanded that President Gen Pervez Musharraf should get these allegations investigated and punish those who were found guilty of squandering public money.
He claimed that since the CDGK had no roots among the people, and all attempts were a mere window-dressing. His contention was that the city government had failed to address the problems in towns and neighbourhoods, such as water supply, sold-waste management. Owing to such an indifferent attitude, over 1,000 councillors out of 3500 had joined the MQM.
Dr Farooq Sattar said that due to apathy of the city government, MQM representatives at the provincial and central level took upon themselves the responsibility of solving problems of the people, despite paucity of resources.
He said that keeping in view the problems being faced by the people of the city, the MQM after successful dialogue with the prime minister, got rupees one billion development package approved. It envisages implementation of 200 schemes. This amount, he said would not be spent on window dressing but on resolving real problems of the people.
Giving details of the package, Dr Farooq Sattar said that Rs 535.532 would be spent on inner city roads; Rs 250.968 on improving sewerage system, Rs 146.050 on water supply; Rs 53.400 on repair of schools, colleges, libraries and hospitals; and Rs 14.050 would be spent on repair and replacement of electric wires and PMTs.
Dr Farooq Sattar claimed that these projects were expected to be completed by December this year. He said that the MQM would keep the people informed from time to time, through press conferences.
He said that after meeting President Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, every MQM MNAs was allocated Rs 50 million for implementing various development schemes. This included Rs 50 million to the MQM MNA from Hyderabad.
