DADU: Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Saturday pledged gas and water supply schemes as well as schemes pertaining to other basic amenities for Manjhand taluka of Jamshoro district.

He made the announcement during his address to Pakistan Peoples Party workers and supporters at the reception camp at Shalmani stop near Sann town on Saturday, when he started his two-day visit to Jamshoro and Dadu districts.

Explaining why uplift work in many areas could not be undertaken, the CM pointed out that outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic had brought all development activities in Sindh to a grinding halt. Since the outbreak, he said, his government had been paying more attention to the health sector.

He complained of gas shortage in the province, and argued that Sindh was producing much of the gas produced in the country but it was not being supplied its required quantum by the federal authorities.

“We will snatch our due share in gas from the federal government if denied,” he remarked.

Mr Shah held out the assurance that people would start getting jobs very soon, and declared that 2021 would be “the year of recruitment”. He said that jobs would be provided strictly on a merit basis.

Addressing a public meeting in Amri town, the chief minister conceded that his government could not properly deliver during the last few years, and attributed this to unavailability of sufficient resources.

Expressing his confidence that PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari would be the next prime minister, he said “he [Bilawal] will deliver services to the masses at their doorsteps”.

Mr Shah also attributed low tax recovery in Sindh to the “ineptness of PTI government at the centre.”

Later, speaking to the media at the residence of Minister for Culture and Tourism Syed Sardar Shah in Jamshoro, he said that under the 18th Constitutional Amendment, the islands off Sindh’s coast were property of the province.

He advised federal ministers to read and understand the amendment.

Published in Dawn, February 7th, 2021