| April 27, 2008 | Sunday | Rabi-us-Sani 20, 1429 |
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Running whilst standing still
GOOD old honest (when left to his own devices) ‘commuter’ Qaim Ali Shah is back in the saddle, after a lengthy break, as chief minister of the province of Sindh.
A large cumbersome billboard raised on the pavement facing the gate of his official residence depicts the portraits of a selection of PPP leaders, with honest Qaim looking like an innocent schoolboy.
In his first stint as CM, during the first of the Benazir Bhutto governments, press headlines every second day proclaimed ‘Qaim comes, Qaim goes.’ He would arrive back in Karachi from Islamabad in the afternoon only to leave on the evening flight having been summoned back to the capital. Thus, he became known as the ‘commuter’.
The press on April 26 carried a headline proclaiming: ‘Street crime in Karachi now zero, claims Qaim’ — on landing at Khairpur. The news item confirmed that he did say this. Let us just look at the three preceding days and at the crimes we know of. On the 23rd, two young schoolgirls were killed in a crossfire between fleeing bandits and their victim in Lyari. On the 24th, a branch of one of my banks in DHA Phase 8 was raided by a gang of robbers who roughed up the employees and decamped with whatever money there was in the till.
On the 25th, during the prayer break, one of our family firm’s offices situated on the second floor of a building on Chundrigar Road was raided by a gang of three, armed with TT automatic pistols. The office was robbed and the entire staff relieved of their cash, valuables and mobile phones. On that day also, three were killed and nine injured in a shootout near Hub police station. Qaim needs to update himself.
Now, a little anecdote for our honourable chief minister. In the 15th century, Louis XI of France would garner ground talk and knowledge each morning from his barber cum valet, Olivier Le Daim, who invariably would assure him that all was well in France. Armed with this information, the king would confront his senior advisers, who informed him otherwise, and tell them they were talking rubbish. This carried on until one day Le Daim was kidnapped and removed from the scene. Better informed, the king then settled down to doing right by his subjects. Qaim Ali Shah should not believe all that is told to him by Nabi Narejo.
Despite the MQM’s protestations, Asif Zardari has wisely posted Dr Shoaib Suddle as Sindh’s inspector general of police. He is a seasoned and efficient policeman, well qualified and well experienced, and we must hope that he will be able to improve the law and order situation (practically non-existent) in Karachi and Sindh.
Suddle is not the MQM’s sole grievance. On April 24, the Sindh government in the person of local government minister Agha Siraj Durrani, whose propensities are well known and recorded, decided arbitrarily to put aside city nazim Mustafa Kamal as the authority for the Karachi Building Control Authority (KBCA) and as chairman of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) and install himself. This city of over 16 million inhabitants is once again at the mercy of newly installed powers that are in a hurry to amass a return on their investments as elected representatives of the people.
Rightly or wrongly, the Sindh Local Government Ordinance (SLGO) was promulgated in 2001. It was a much needed law that attempted to devolve government to the citizens of the cities, zilas and districts, but it had its deficiencies — such as no right to tax. The appointed could govern but they had to find their own sources of income. Governing is not easy, Karachi being unique in that it has some 18 agencies controlling land and forming a patchwork quilt of laws which overlap each other in territory and substance.
The SLGO contains those areas of law which are the main source of revenues for the controlling powers, namely town planning and building control, and the distribution of water and management of sewerage. The City District Government Karachi read the law and rightfully assumed control of the KBCA and KWSB, notwithstanding the fact that the SLGO had failed to repeal the prevailing Sindh Building Control Ordinance of 1979 and the Karachi Water and Sewage Board Act of 1996.
To overcome this conflict, the CDGK nazim, by the issuance of a notification, was appointed as head of both the KBCA and the KWSB and would work under the provisions of the 1979 Ordinance (SBCO) and the 1996 Act.
Litigation ensued. Constitutional Petition 960 of 2003, Ch Zaheer Ahmed vs the City District Government Karachi (2006 YLR 2537), was filed in the High Court of Sindh. The matter was considered in terms of the overlap between the SBCO and the SLGO. The court upheld the provisions of the SBCO, considering that despite the SLGO coming later the provisions of the SBCO shall prevail.
An appeal was filed before the Supreme Court of Pakistan which was admitted for regular hearing on the basis that inter alia a conflict had arisen between two decisions of the High Court of Sindh. This petition remains pending.
Then came two petitions filed by other petitioners before the High Court of Sindh, Constitutional Petition 274 of 2005 (myself along with other petitioners) and Constitutional Petition 275 of 2005. They have been argued in favour of the CDGK, reserved for judgment, and then were sent for rehearing on the retirement of one of the judges, and remain pending for hearing before the High Court.
Now, by a stroke of a pen, former favourite minister Agha Siraj Durrani, now once again a Sindh government minister, whose propensities are well known and recorded, in his finite wisdom has decided that the functions of town planning and building control as well as water and sewerage should be taken away from the CDGK. By an undemocratic stroke of a pen, a notification has been issued appointing himself as head honcho of the KBCA and KWSB. The city deserves to be run by its citizens through its local government, not through bureaucrats and ministers who either disregard or change laws at their whim and fancy.
The city nazim, Mustafa Kamal, subsequently on April 25 has asserted his legal right to control the city through the provisions of the prevailing SLGO, 2001. He is within the law; he rightfully does not wish the KBCA and KWSB to be kidnapped. He is hardworking and he is apparently honest. We should support him.
arfc@cyber.net.pk
