KARACHI: Environmentalists and civil society activists are sceptical about a recent government decision to develop a major storm-water drain in Clifton and its surroundings into a recreational spot and fear that the project may spell a disaster as almost all storm-water drains of the city have either been completely encroached or significantly reduced in size, causing flooding in many areas in monsoon.

Contrary to the government’s claims, they also believe that the public space would be gentrified and used for commercial activities.

“We saw flooding in many areas this year. This was so because we have almost eliminated storm-water drains carrying away rainwater to the sea,” said environmentalist Tofiq Pasha Mooraj.

He was sharing his concerns over the Nahr-i-Khayyam project that the government plans to build under an agreement with the People and Nature Initiative (Pani), a group comprising 15 architects, through which a park would be developed and adopted for 30 years.

Mr Mooraj emphasised that storm-water drains were not meant to carry sewage as was the case right now and it’s the government’s responsibility to ensure that sewage was treated before being discharged into the sea.

Need stressed for carrying out a detailed EIA study and technical evaluation of the project

He called upon the government to invite public objections before signing the agreement and ensure transparency by awarding the project to a party through a competitive process under its public procurement rules and regulations.

‘Gentrification of public space’

Rejecting a government’s claim that the land would not be used for commercial activities, Mr Mooraj said: “Who would invest Rs1.5 billion in a project [under the proposed agreement] without thinking of any profit? This is business and the land would be used for commercial activities.”

He regretted the government policy of giving away public spaces to private parties on the grounds of shortage of funds and in the name of ‘development’, which in fact had restricted access of the poor to public spaces.

Endorsing reservations related to flooding, sources in the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) said since Nahr-i-Khayyam was part of a natural drainage system, the project required a detailed environmental impact assessment (EIA) study and technical evaluation by a multi-expert team including hydrologists.

A scientific evaluation was also important given the threats posed by climate change, they said, sharing that the one-kilometre-long canal had already lost half of its land to land grabbers, reducing its width from 200 feet to less than 100 feet.

Seasoned architect and activist Arif Hasan did not make any direct comments on the project, saying that he wasn’t aware of its technical details.

However, he favoured a simple, low-cost project for the canal as was once prepared by the Orangi Pilot Project team, which envisaged that the channel should be covered and a septic tank built for the basic treatment of sewage.

Also, he suggested that parks should be simple, low-cost, providing safe spaces for sports to children, who were now using roads for this purpose.

Neglected parks

To Zain Mustafa, an architect and teacher, the public spaces of the city were being exploited under the guise of “development” and “beatification” when it’s simple gentrification for capital and political gains.

“The government would do well to uplift the Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Park located near Nahr-i-Khayyam and the one along the beach next to a shopping mall and, of course, the Bagh Ibne Qasim too.

“There are plenty of forgotten parks and other recreational spaces that can be cleaned up and made more user friendly without being ticketed or made to resemble ideas from Dubai,” he argued.

The city’s beautification projects, in his opinion, were not thought through rigorously and were immature at best.

Chief Minister’s Adviser Murtaza Wahab defended the project and insisted that the land would remain public property and would only have small tuck shops.

“The project is to treat [the] canal’s sewage and beautify its surroundings. Second, the canal would neither be blocked or covered and filled with recycled water,” he said, adding that the government would construct a conduit to separate sewage for treatment.

‘Trust the group’

All stakeholders, Mr Wahab pointed out, were on board. The government had the authority to award a project to a party but it would ensure that public interests were protected and follow any prerequisite legal requirements.

Karachi Mayor Wasim Akhtar also supported the project but was critical of the Sindh government which, he said, did not give due credit to him and his team, which had been pushing for the public-private partnership project with the Pani group for three years.

Sharing some features of the proposed project, architect Shahid Abdulla representing Pani said the first step would be canal’s dredging followed by its lining and sewage treatment once the government was done with the conduit.

“The drain would neither be covered nor blocked and its opening would remain the same. The whole project would take two to three years to complete,” he said, adding that the team planned to recycle and reuse 40 per cent of sewage.

To the criticism related to the project’s gentrification, he said: “Trust this group (Pani). We only want to create something nice and calm for Karachiites. There won’t be any commercial activity except some stalls for snacks.

“We couldn’t have ticketing system because we don’t own that place. Our experience at other projects, however, has showed that one has to take care of the infrastructure to ensure that it remains safe from public damage and pilferage.”

The team, he said, had an uphill task of generating funds for the project, which had already been delayed for three years.

Published in Dawn, October 15th, 2019