KARACHI: Karachiites losing hope for more CNG buses
KARACHI, March 18: For decades, Karachiites have been facing the chronic problem of public transport shortage and for quite some time they are being assured of the arrival of thousands of wide-bodied CNG buses ‘very soon’. However, the assurance has proved a lip service so far as their dream of seeking these buses on city roads is yet to come true. There is no definite deadline or a firm time-bound action plan either.
After this bitter experience of broken promises, Karachiites have now realised statements and pledges in this regard sum up to nothing.
Early last year, Karachiites began to hear the promise that the first batch of CNG buses would arrive in city by December (2006). Though many statements had been issued by the officials concerned in the following months but nothing of the sort happened by or even after the given date.
A few weeks back, the authorities stated that the first batch of CNG buses would be arriving in March 2007 as a South Koran automobile company, Daewoo, had set up a bus-making plant having a capacity of 3,000 CNG buses per month at Razzaqabad, on the National Highway. However, even after the passage of the first half of this month, there is nothing on the ground to believe that a single CNG bus would be delivered to Karachiites by the company in the next couple of weeks.
There could be no two opinions regarding the importance of cost-effective, fast and efficient public transport system in giving the country’s trade and economy a boost. This is why many cities of the world with less population than Karachi do have modern public transport system, including underground train network. Karachi is perhaps the only big urban city without even a fully functional over-ground train system.
In our part of the world, the governments and experts fully realise the importance of the circular trains and modern buses, but some international elements do not want to see Pakistan, especially its big cities like Karachi, enjoying an efficient and cost effective public transport system. Many published reports hint at the role of lending organisations like the World Bank and IMF in the closure of the Karachi Transport Corporation (KTC), which had a fleet of thousands of wide-bodied buses, besides trained staff and well-equipped bus depots. Traces of similar vested interests may also be found in the closure of KCR and the pathetically slow process of its revival. The order of complete revival of the KCR was issued by President Pervez Musharraf in 2004, but despite passage of three long years, the KCR could not be revived.
The city government under City Nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal also sees solution of chronic public transport problem in Karachi in the revival of KCR, and intends to brining in CNG buses. It is said that old and shabby smoke-emitting buses and minibuses would be replaced with 8,000 new CNG buses in the next four years and the first batch was to arrive by December 2006.
Last month, the Central Development Working Party set up a steering committee to finalise a loan interest subsidy project of Rs5 billion for the private sector to provide 500-600 CNG buses each in Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Islamabad and to set up CNG stations in big cities.
It was said that the government had decided to help private companies operate CNG buses in four major cities and set up CNG stations. A CDWP-constituted steering committee was to finalise other modalities. However, this ambitious plan is without a first deadline, and nobody knows when these 500-600 CNG buses would arrive Karachi.—PPI
