KARACHI: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) vice president Haleem Adil Sheikh on Tuesday said that ‘corruption mafia’ in Sindh was devouring the funds meant for heart patients, and in this regard referred to the poor state of the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases (NICVD), Karachi.

“When the Sindh government is asked about its achievements, it quotes the NICVD, but what is fact is that the institute has become a den of corruption and is hit by mismanagement,” he claimed while speaking to the media outside the Sindh Assembly building on Tuesday.

Corruption in the NICVD had broken all records, he alleged, and claimed that PPP leader Naveed Qamar had handed over the institute to his brother, Nadeem Qamar, on a virtual contract.

He quoted a report of the director general of audit, and said huge discrepancies were unearthed in the NICVD’s 2019-2020 audit report.

He accused the PPP government of being involved in corruption through fake bank accounts, money-laundering and fake appointments in the education department.

He further alleged that PPP elements were also involved in corruption in the health, local government and revenue departments. He pointed out lands of forest department had also been usurped.

Repeating his allegation that up to Rs3 trillion had been misappropriated from pension funds, the PTI leader said the other such examples included the airplane commission case, tractor scam and embezzlement in the funds for water management and irrigation schemes.

“Taxpayers’ looted money is docked in Swiss banks and was spent on purchasing properties like Park Lane. Corruption had also been resorted to in the Roshan Sindh Programme, wheat supplies and fish ponds schemes,” he added.

Mr Sheikh deplored that 53 per cent families in Sindh still lived below the poverty line and 60pc population of the province was compelled to drink sewage-mixed water.

He claimed that fake tendering was in vogue in the works and services and excise and taxation departments.

He also alleged that corruption had been resorted to even in the funds for coronavirus control and financial aid for the rain-affected people.

He complained that no member of the opposition was represented in the Public Accounts Committee or standing committees of the Sindh Assembly.

In Sindh, the democratic politics of Benazir Bhutto had come to an end and it had been replaced with a “civilian dictatorship”.

Published in Dawn, January 13th, 2021