KARACHI: The City Council on Tuesday unanimously passed the budget of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) amounting to Rs27.145bn for fiscal 2017-18.

During the debate on the budget, which was presented in the council a day earlier by Mayor Wasim Akhtar, several changes proposed by members of the treasury and the opposition sides were incorporated.

Besides, the revenue and expenditure sides were recalculated making it Rs9.9m surplus budget from Rs300m deficit one when it was originally introduced in the council.

The house was told that the total revenues of the annual budget would be Rs27,148.65 million against annual expenditures of Rs27,135.67m.

The City Council’s session was presided over by Mayor Akhtar in which a total of 19 resolutions were passed.

The session was informed that the increase of Rs301m in the share of the KMC by the provincial government on the head of Octroi Zila Tax turned a deficit budget into a surplus one.

Mayor Akhtar said he was trying to get more development packages from the Sindh and federal governments for the metropolis as whatever the city’s administration would get would be spent on its uplift.

He said his administration would not discriminate against any district or union council. “Not a single rupee would be spent anywhere with discrimination. We’ll maintain transparency in development works and each scheme would duly be approved by the council,” said the mayor.

“Not a single work would be carried out without approval of the City Council.”

Leader of the house, Aslam Shah Afridi, said all viable proposals from the opposition benches should be incorporated into the budget. He said Karachi earned 70 per cent of revenues for the country, thus, the metropolis should get development share accordingly.

Leader of the opposition Karamullah Waqasi said development schemes proposed by the opposition should be incorporated in the next fiscal budget. He said union committees, where the opposition was in power, should not be discriminated against.

He demanded that salaries being given to ghost employees in the KMC should be stopped forthwith. He said the UCs should be duly empowered to ensure people getting their problems resolved on their doorstep.

Nadeem Hashmi, chairman, finance committee, said an elected mayor had presented a good budget after a gap of nine years. He lamented that not a single out of 143 schemes, which the mayor had sent to the provincial government for next year’s provincial annual development programme was approved, while the mayor had taken every UC on board and ensured everyone irrespective of who affiliated with which party for indiscriminate development funding.

Member city council Junaid Mukati said none of the provincial and federal governments had allocated any big development funding for Karachi and were doing nothing to modernise the city. He demanded that the KMC’s development budget was equally distributed among all the UCs.

Another member Tehseen Abidi said the ghost employees’ salaries had been released by the non-elected administrators in the past.

Amanullah Afridi, parliamentary leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, claimed it was the federal government, which brought peace to the city, which had plagued Karachi for decades. He went on to say that Islamabad had gifted Green Line mass transit scheme.

He said the prime minister had many projects in his mind for Karachi.

“We believe that he would announce more packages for Karachi very soon.”

Speaking over the KMC’s budget, Mr Afridi lamented that many UCs run by the opposition parties had been discriminated against. However, he said the opposition members had faith in the mayor who would review the document and make it all-encompassing.

Akbar Hashmi of Jamiat-i-Ulema Islam-Fazl, proposed for a Rs50m package for each UC, which would ensure rapid development everywhere in the city.

Alam Zeb Alai of the Awami National Party said his party wanted the city to prosper and they would be there as helping hand for the mayor. He invited the mayor to visit his UC and resolve the issues confronted by the people.

Khalil Imam demanded that Rs12 billion, which the provincial government had allocated for the Karachi Package, should be spent by taking the city council in confidence. “This will show how transparent those schemes were.”

Karamat Chohan demanded for a separate fund for the communities practicing minority faiths.

Musfara Jamal said despite being 51pc of the country’s population, yet little recreational facilities available for them. She said there was not a single women-only park in the city. She asked the mayor to take care of the issue and invest in building parks and toilets for women in the metropolis.

Saeedullah Afridi said water was the core issue as people were not getting water in many localities.

Advocate Arif Khan said members should not criticise the budget for the sake of criticism, as healthy criticism could help the elected administration to improve its performance. He asked all the members to keep the city supreme and should not stick to the party politics at the cost of Karachi’s betterment.

Abdul Samad Brohi demanded that effective proposals be kept for emancipation of young people. The mayor praised him and asked Mr Brohi to prepare concrete proposals and submit to him.

Shahnawaz Jadoon complained that his UC had been neglected in the budget. Nadeem Arain said the mayor had given more time to the opposition, which was a healthy sign.

The city council members also praised the Pakistan cricket team for winning the Champions’ Trophy for the first time in history.

Published in Dawn, June 21st, 2017