KARACHI: As many as 22 more lawmakers from both sides of the aisle on Friday took part in the post-budget discussion in the Sindh Assembly for seven long hours, most members belonging to the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party and opposition Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf opted to praise and condemn each other’s leadership instead of forwarding suggestion and proposals with regard to their constituencies.

Around 21 members from the ruling and opposition parties were present when the sitting began with a delay of one hour. The number of the members increased slowly to 55, but there were only 12 members, including nine women MPAs, in the house when Deputy Speaker Rehana Leghari at 9:07pm adjourned the house to Monday at 10am as most of the speakers had left after delivering their speeches.

Syed Abdur Rashid, the lone member of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal from Lyari, mainly confined his budget speech on the issues relating to his constituency.

He criticised the provincial government for not holding pre-budget session. “It seems that the PPP-led Sindh government was busy in forming the government in the centre and that’s why the pre-budget session was not summoned,” he said.

22 lawmakers from treasury, opposition benches participate

Shortage of anti-rabies vaccine

He deplored that only Rs10 billion was kept for Karachi out of Rs1.7 trillion budget and all mega schemes for the city were to be completed in the allocated amount.

He said that there was a shortage of anti-rabies vaccines in the province and referred to a dog-bite incident in Lyari the other day.

“The victim boy was taken to the Lyari General Hospital at around 7pm and was denied vaccine and asked to come before noon next day,” he said.

MPA Rasheed also complained that the development works were not being carried out in the opposition constituencies, including Lyari.

“The PPP’s Sindh government is carrying out development works in Lyari just ahead of the local government election. These uplift works are part of the PPP preparations for the local government elections,” he added.

Health Minister Dr Azra Fazal Pechuhu in her budget speech said that strict action was taken against staff of the department on complaints of corruption and malpractices.

Nadeem Siddiqui of the MQM-P said that PPP government had given 15 budgets but no significant improvement in health and education sectors was seen during the past 14 years.

Minister for Universities and Boards Ismail Rahu said that there were only 10 public sector universities in Sindh till 2008 but the PPP-led Sindh government established 17 more during the last 13 years. He said that the provincial government had always enhanced grants for varsities.

PTI’s Parliamentary Leader Khurram Sher Zaman said that the provincial government made false promises by earmarking huge development budget. “You (PPP) could not fulfil your earlier promises,” he said.

Women Development Minister Shehla Raza said that the department had been allocated Rs94 million for the year 2022-23.

PPP’s Dr Lal Chand Ukrani said that the health facilities up to UC level had been provided in every district across Sindh.

MQM-P’s Sanjay Parwani and Muhammad Hussain Khan; PTI’s Dr Seema Zia, Shahnawaz Jadoon, Dr Imran Ali Shah, Malik Shehzad Awan; GDA’s Nand Kumar Goklani; and PPP’s Shaheena Sher Ali, Sharmeela Farooqui, Imdad Pitafi, Gayan Chand, Zia Abbas, Tanzeela Qambrani and Sajid Jokhio.

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2022