KARACHI: Leader of the Opposition in Sindh Assembly Firdous Shamim Naqvi on Friday said the Sindh government was hiding a recent audit report since “it exposes the government’s misdeeds, corruption and failures”.

Addressing a press conference at the committee room of the Sindh Assembly building, he said: “This report has been published in April [last year] and since it is not a document on which the government can take pride, it is hiding it”.

He was flanked by a number of lawmakers belonging to his Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf.

He said he got hold of a copy of the audit report, yet, the government was not sharing it on the floor of the Sindh Assembly.

“The government has deliberately hidden it for the past eight months since it exposes the real performance of the Sindh government, which is definitely not something on which it could take pride.”

‘Instead of lasting 20 years, new roads are damaged within a year’

He levelled serious allegations on the provincial government run by the Pakistan Peoples Party saying “commission, kickback and speed money is rampant in every penny spent in the name of development”.

He blamed the lawmakers belonging to the provincial government and bureaucracy for being involved in corrupt practices.

“This is the reason; details of these things should go to the audit people and the National Accountability Bureau.”

He said development works were being done in such a manner in many districts of Sindh that it was normal to see a school building constructed just three years ago suddenly caving in.

“Instead of lasting for 20 years, new roads are damaged within a year to their construction. All this shows the development funds are not being spent honestly,” said Mr Naqvi.

He added that the report had compiled the information of 26 years, but the last 13 years were discussed in detail with records as report since 2006 had not yet been issued.

He said almost all audit paragraphs were complied with, yet, the outcome of all those departments that complied with those paragraphs turned out to be zilch.

He blamed the government for misappropriating Rs151 billion. He said the services of not a single officer of the Anti-Corruption Establishment had been suspended for being inefficient.

He said the auditor general’s office had blamed inefficiency on the part of the provincial government as key reason for all those misappropriations.

“Public funds have been wasted because of lack of planning and vision.”

He said the government had no planning for eradication of hunger, poverty and 15 other such targets, which was evident from the fact that no funds were being allocated for those sectors.

He said the auditor general was not being informed about the allocation of Rs6bn to revive Sindh Bank’s operations.

He said the report had shown discrepancies in allocations for irrigation department.

He also spoke over similar gaps shown in the report vis-à-vis excise and taxation and other departments. He said there was no record available for Rs310m sales tax.

He demanded a forensic audit of the government’s spending.

He demanded either two public accounts committees be formed in Sindh like the federation and Punjab or the opposition be given either chairmanship of the PAC or majority of its strength be comprised of the opposition members.

Regarding the persisting gas shortages in Sindh, he said it was Sindh government which did not respond positively when the federal government suggested for using LNG in agriculture sector.

Published in Dawn, January 4th, 2020