KARACHI, Dec 20: The nazims and councillors of all the 178 union councils (UCs) of the city will help the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) in collection of monthly water tax from consumers living in their respective areas for getting 25 per cent ‘commission’.

Well-placed sources told Dawn that the water utility will give 25 per cent amount from the total collection of the water tax from consumers living in each union council. The system is likely to start functioning by the end of January.

The sources explained that if the total bill collection amount from a UC was Rs1 million then the water utility will give Rs0.25 million to that UC as its share for helping the KWSB in the bill collection efforts. The 25 per cent amount of the total bills would only be spent by the UCs on water and sewerage related projects, the sources added.

They said a decision to involve all the 178 UCs in the monthly bill collection drive was taken by the city nazim, Mustafa Kamal, for increasing the revenue base of the water utility and it would be implemented from January 2007.

The new system of tax collection aims at bringing more consumers and areas into the tax net and the UC nazims and councillors concerned would help the utility in this regard. “If the bill recovery goes up, their share of 25 per cent will also be increased,” said a KWSB official.

The official said the KWSB had over 1.4 million consumers and in order to increase its revenue base, a system of monthly billing was introduced and at present the KWSB was distributing monthly bills to 1.1 million consumers. The total recovery of the utility during the last five months was much higher than that of the whole previous year.

The sources, however, maintained that the hundreds of thousands of consumers, who were receiving water tax, were not paying the dues. The city nazim, who is also the chairman of the KWSB, is dissatisfied with the present position as a number of localities and people in the city are still using KWSB services without paying any tax.

The sources said that under the new system, the UC nazims and councillors would monitor the bill collection system and would deal directly with the defaulters and help the water utility in disconnecting their connections.

According to the sources, sharing 25 per cent of the total bill collection amount with the UCs would make no negative impact on the KWSB’s financial position as the UCs would be bound to utilise the 25 per cent amount on water and sewerage related projects in their respective localities, which was otherwise carried out by the KWSB.

City Nazim Mustafa Kamal, the sources said, would soon present this plan to the City Council and it will be enforced by the end of the next month.