KARACHI: The Sindh government has raised its voice against the federal government’s attitude saying that despite its commitment to share the expenditures on targeted operation in the city, so far no funds have been released.

Besides taking up the issue of extraordinary burden on the provincial exchequer, the Sindh government has decided to generate electricity from garbage in the metropolis, which generates 17,000 tonnes of garbage daily from which 250MW power could be generated.

Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah raised the issue of extraordinary burden on the provincial government during his meeting with chairman of the Senate Standing Committee on Interior Affairs Rehman Malik, who called on him here on Monday at the CM House. He said that the federal government had vowed to share financial burden incurred on the targeted operation launched under the National Action Plan but not even a single penny had been released for it.

Minister told to prepare a policy for handing over garbage to a private company for power generation

“This has put an extraordinary burden on the provincial exchequer,” he said and urged Senator Malik to discuss this matter in his committee. “I am ready to brief the committee about the expenditures the provincial government has sustained,” Mr Malik said.

He assured the chief minister that he would put the matter before the committee and discuss it so that the burden of the provincial government could be lessened.

Mr Shah also said that the federal government had not given due share in China-Pakistan Economic Corridor projects to Sindh and his government was providing proper security to the CPEC projects and even looking after the security of the Chinese nationals working in non-CPEC projects.

Power generation from garbage

Presiding over a meeting on ‘Waste and water energy project’ here at the CM House, the chief minister said that Karachi was generating 17,000 tonnes of garbage every day from which 250MW power could be generated. He directed the relevant authority to prepare a policy to hand over garbage for power generation.

The chief minister said that according to experts 50MW power could be generated by feeding 3,000 tonnes of garbage every day. “We generate 17,000 tonnes of garbage and can easily install five plants, each of 50MW to generate 250MW electricity from garbage,” he said.

He asked Local Government Minister Saeed Ghani to prepare a policy of handing over garbage to any private company for power generation.

Recycling waste water

The chief minister also directed the water board to prepare a proposal for recycling 73MGD waste water for industrial purposes.

“This is high time to take necessary measures for the implementation of the project,” he said and asked P&D chairman Mohammad Waseem to send the proposal to the Public Private Partnership (PPP) unit for expeditious processing of an unsolicited bid as per the PPP rules.

In the meeting it was proposed to convert an RO plant installed at Hub into a 100MGD desalination unit. Along this desalination unit, a 900MW RLNG-based power plant could also be installed, the experts proposed to the chief minister.

MoU with Belgium

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the Sindh government and Belgium state-owned Wallonia Export-Investment Agency was signed for the promotion of trade, investment and jointly working on the PPP mode in Sindh.

On behalf of the Sindh government, director of the Sindh Board of Investment Azeem Uqaili and on behalf of the Wallonia Export-Investment Agency Ms Pascale Delcomminette signed the MoU. CM Murad Ali Shah and Ambassador of Belgium Frederic Verheydin also witnessed the ceremony.

The chief minister told the trade delegation led by Mr Verheydin that there was a big potential in corporate cattle farming in Sindh. The visiting trade delegation showed interest in renewable energy, urban water supply for Karachi and the BRT. It was decided that Belgium’s traders and the Sindh Board of Investment would jointly explore avenues for investment.

Published in Dawn, November 6th, 2018