KARACHI: Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Tuesday said the latest announcement made by Prime Minister Imran Khan vis-à-vis awarding Pakistani nationality to people hailing from Bangladesh and Afghanistan and living either illegally or as refugees in the country could not be implemented if it did not obey the Pakistan Citizenship Act, 1951.

“It will open floodgates [of illegal aliens] if an unlawful decision is made [to accord citizenship to] people who are living in our country illegally,” said Mr Shah while addressing the post-budget press conference at the Sindh Assembly Building’s auditorium.

While briefing reporters, Mr Shah spoke at length about the hardships and challenges his government was facing and trying to cope with despite ‘unprecedented’ low financial transfers came from Islamabad in the first two months of the current fiscal year.

Originally, Mr Shah’s previous government had presented its full-year budget in its dying days; however, it got authorisation from the then assembly for expenditures of three months and left it to the next government to get the rest of the budget authorised by the assembly or revamp it fully.

Mr Shah was asked repeatedly by reporters to comment on PM Khan’s announcement which sparked a controversy, particular in Sindh which bears most of the burden of illegal aliens.

He said he had no doubt that if an announcement like that was unlawful it could not be implemented.

Says the side of district ADP increased from Rs30bn to Rs35bn

“It is clear that only lawful decisions for granting of Pakistani citizenship could be implemented,” he said, adding, “The announcements involving such issues as serious as granting citizenship to non-Pakistanis should be made by following provisions as enshrined in the Citizenship Act.”

“[Implementation on] such decisions requires amendments in the Citizenship Act by parliament,” said Mr Shah.

He said the Pakistan Peoples Party and other parties would resist any such move when and if the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf brought the Citizenship Act for amendment.

Kalabagh dam a ‘dead horse’

He said the Kalabagh dam project was a ‘dead horse’ and that issue did not come in discussion during his meeting with PM Khan.

Responding to a query about his meeting with the prime minister during his recent visit to Karachi, Mr Shah said he shared his government’s reservations regarding transfers of senior officers without consulting the provincial governments concerned.

He said the prime minister assured him that it would not happen next time.

Besides, he said, he also requested the PM for prompt transfer of 57 per cent share of the provinces in revenue collections and he received the assurance for that as well.

He said he spoke over the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases and National Institute of Child Health, which had been handed to the Sindh government in 2012 since then the provincial government had released gracious grants for them, however, its handing over to the Sindh government was challenged by certain employees and the matter was sub-judice.

“I requested the prime minister either to support us in this case or assure us that these hospitals are given the support at par with what we are according them.”

Mr Shah denied reports about the prime minister’s announcement during his Karachi visit that he had asked Sindh government to do garbage lifting work in the city in two months. He said no such directive was given by the prime minister during his meeting with him.

He said if the prime minister had asked the Sindh governor to take such action before making the announcement in front of public then the “Sindh governor is not the Sindh government”.

In the same vein, he asked the governor that “he should also not transgress his constitutional authority”.

He said decisions like granting of citizenship and lifting of garbage should not be announced in public meetings. “I request to the federal government to switch from its present jalsa mode to the government mode.”

Cut in new ADP schemes spending

CM Shah said his government had to slash Rs24 billion out of Rs50bn it had reserved for new development schemes under its Annual Development Programme for 2018-19.

He said the government made such a decision because of short supply of due funds from the federal government. He said his government had received Rs49bn less on account of federal transfer of funds till June when the last fiscal year expired.

Mr Shah said the size of the district ADP had been increased from Rs30bn to Rs35bn to enable the elected local government representatives to implement development schemes at grass-roots level.

He said Rs18bn had been reserved for new development projects in the ongoing financial year as those included upgrading of district headquarters hospitals in 17 districts — 14 of them would be completed by June 2019 while those in Umerkot, Mithi, and Kandhkot would take some more time to complete.

He said 31 new trauma centres would be established in the current fiscal year in various parts of the province.

He said to cope with the sea intrusion, under the new development schemes, his government had planned to construct an 87-kilometre-long coastal highway to benefit the coastal towns.

He conceded a lot of work was still there to do for his government to improve public education sector in Sindh. At present, he said, several schemes were being completed to provide the missing facilities at 4,650 schools of Sindh that had at least 80pc enrolment of students in the government-run schools.

He said the government’s efforts would boost the enrolment by more than 550,000 children.

Austerity measures

Mr Shah said his government would sell off luxurious cars which were more than 10 years old as expenses on repair and maintenance of such vehicles became greater.

He said under the austerity measures of his government there would be a complete ban on purchase of new vehicles except those required for emergency and mandatory services like police vehicles and ambulances.

He said that decisions of the federal government including auction of luxurious vehicles could not create lasting effects on issues related to governance and running affairs of the country. “Impact of such decisions could not go beyond a few months.”

The CM said that the auction of the luxurious vehicles took place at the PM House the other day and now everybody came to see that how many of those expensive, or armoured, vehicles could be sold to public.

“If such expensive vehicles could be auctioned off then anybody could come forward and sell two of my armoured vehicles to help me getting their due market price.

“Now even buffaloes of the PM House are being sold off, but people on social media have started advising the rulers that instead of selling these buffaloes their milk should be sold for greater profit as selling of buffaloes could attract launching of investigation by NAB on account of causing loss to the national exchequer,” he quipped.

Published in Dawn, September 19th, 2018