KARACHI: Presenting a six-point solution to Karachi’s myriad problems, Pak Sarzameen Party chairman Syed Mustafa Kamal on Tuesday demanded that the over a dozen land controlling agencies providing municipal services in the city be made part of the city government and placed under an elected mayor.

Speaking at a press conference at his party’s Pakistan House headquarters, he said there were 18 land-controlling authorities in the city, which have been providing municipal services in their respective jurisdictions for the past many decades.

“All these 18 municipal services, including cantonment boards, DHA, KPT, Port Qasim, MDA, SITE, Railways and CAA, should be de-notified in accordance with a Supreme Court verdict and made part of the city district government whose head should be an elected mayor of the metropolis,” Mr Kamal said, adding that the mayor should be made head of the city’s municipal services.

Mr Kamal, who remained the mayor of Karachi between 2005 and 2010, said that the metropolis should be restored as one district with 18 towns. “Karachi was always one district but it was the PPP which just for its political and ethnic considerations divided it into seven pieces,” he said.

Accompanied by PSP president Anis Kaimkhani, he said the PPP divided the city on the pretext that people were facing problems in reaching government offices due to long distances. “This argument is factually incorrect since the offices of now defunct 18 towns were situated at a much closer distance than the offices in a district,” he added.

The PSP chief demanded that the Sindh chief minister revoke his own decision through which he had placed the city’s master plan department under the Sindh Building Control Authority. “The [Karachi] master plan department must be restored as an independent and autonomous organisation.”

Highlighting the need for a transparent census, he said that Karachi’s population was between 25 million and 30m and the city’s seats of National and provincial assemblies should be increased as per the population ratio to be reflected in a “true” census.

He said that the power and resources the Sindh chief minister got through 18th Amendment must be devolved to district, town and union committee levels.

He said that the provinces must issue the provincial finance commission awards on the pattern of the National Finance Commission award through which they got funds from the centre. “The federal government should play its role in ensuring transfer of money to the grassroots level since it’s public money, not the personal property of the chief minister.”

Takes a dig at CM

Commenting on CM Murad Ali Shah’s claim that construction of high-rise buildings in the city caused difficulties in draining rainwater, Mr Kamal said that after 2008 not a single building was constructed in Karachi without the approval of the SBCA and greasing the palms of “PPP bigwigs” through former SBCA chief Manzoor Kaka.

“The CM himself put the master plan under the SBCA in 2013. Even if the city was dilapidated, the job of the rulers is not to relay news but to solve problems. Sindh has been under PPP rule for the last 12 years. Why nothing has been done?” he asked.

He said the PPP government even took away governor’s functions pertaining to universities and educational boards.

Accusing the PPP and Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan of fanning ethnic hatred, he said that the two parties wanted to ignite people’s emotions just to cover up their performance.

He said the PSP would soon issue a ‘white paper’ on the performance of the recently dissolved local bodies.

Published in Dawn, September 2nd, 2020