KARACHI, Oct 31: The opposition in the City Council sought a debate on several mega-projects worth millions of rupees being carried out by the city government instead of discussing “petty matters” like granting the approval of running a photo studio inside Safari Park in the council’s session on Wednesday.

The point was raised by opposition member Saifuddin when a resolution was tabled by a treasury member in the council meeting for granting approval to the highest bid of Rs92,500 to run the photo studio.

In the meeting presided over by Convener Nasreen Jalil, the City Council passed five resolutions – three of them unanimously while opposition members voted against the remaining two.

Treasury member Mohibuddin Fatmi moved two resolutions regarding the approval of the highest bid of Rs3.5 million received by the city government on June 11 in an open auction for getting the licence of the Safari Park entry fee for 2007-08. The second resolution was for granting approval to the highest bidder for the aforementioned photo studio.

Leader of the Opposition Saeed Ghani, Shaikh Mahboobur Rehman, Ramazan Awan and Junaid Makati spoke against the two resolutions.

With regard to the entry fee in Safari Park, the opposition members said that the amount of the entry fee to be collected from an individual was not mentioned in the resolution and it should be specified so that the contractor would not impose an exaggerated fee.

They also said that the amount of licence fee for running the photo studio was not impressive and instead of bringing this matter before the council, the nazim or high officials could approve it on their own.

They maintained that matters relating to a number of projects which were being carried out in the metropolis costing millions of rupees were never brought before the City Council.

Mr Ghani later told Dawn that being a member of the council’s finance committee, he had sought the details of the development projects being carried out by the CDGK, but the latter never bothered to reply.

The opposition members also raised the issue of participation of the City Council’s monitoring committee for the community development department in the aforementioned tendering process, to which the convener, who is also the city naib nazim, agreed and promised to look into the matter.

Treasury members Abdul Jalil, Asif Siddiqui and Masood Mahmood also took part in the discussion. However, the resolutions were passed by majority votes of the treasury, while the opposition voted against it.

The council passed three resolutions regarding the auction of tea stalls in Safari Park and the approval for the layout plan of Gul-i-Rana Colony and Kachchi Para, Solider Bazaar before the session was put off to Thursday.