KARACHI - Mayor Wasim Akhtar said that Karachi would have been ahead of Lahore now had it got its right share in distribution of resources.
He expressed these views while addressing to a press conference in the KMC Head Office on Wednesday.
Establishment of six districts was injustice to Karachi while people of the city were deprived of clean water and proper sewerage system, garbage lifting and disposal was also not being done and the city has no electricity, he added.
“How long our rulers would continue to cheat the people here, citizens of Karachi would no more be made fool now and I will go to the court against Karachi Port Trust (KPT) too which withheld our Rs800 million whereas, Allied Bank withheld Rs1.75 billion and the Sindh government curtailed Rs34 billion from OZT Share of KMC,” he said.
Wasim said that Karachi subjected to injustice under the veil of SLGO 2013, and the Sindh government doing such development works which had to be done by the KMC and revenue of the KMC was being gone to other organisations.
The mayor said that the result of development works that has been done by the elected local government representatives in the city was not so good despite of excellent working because of conspiracy against the local government system which they want to be remain weakened.
He said that the powers given to the provinces with the 18th amendment in the constitution were not exercised. “I am fighting for the local government system of whole country and not only for Karachi,” he added.
He urged that the politicians who were taking part in the upcoming general elections process to make the basic nursery of democracy strong and powerful so that the local governments could deliver and solve the problems of people at the lowest level of the government.
He said that the KMC have 35 departments and about 13 thousand staff and the salary amount increases with every year but the KMC receive the same amount which is pure injustice. No policy could be formulated while showing the 30 million population of the city as just 15 million, he added.
He said: “We had submitted 143 development schemes for 2017-18 budget with the coordination of all six DMCs but the provincial government included not a single schemes out of these in its uplift plan. We have given Rs500 million to each union council which is first time in the city and still we are doing the water and sewerage related works,” he added.
Giving summary of the KMC performance from October 2016 to April 2018, he said a total of 473 schemes were taken in the head of ADP in 2016-17 out of which 286 were completed and remaining 187 carried forward to 2017-18.
The total cost of these schemes was Rs10,802,110 million, he said and adding that in the current fiscal year till April 2018, a total of 459 schemes were taken which include the 272 schemes initiated by the mayor and during 2017-18 total expenditures incurred on these were Rs2,516,681 million.
Wasim said that out of these 154 schemes have been completed and 169 ongoing. 2017-18 expenditure for salary was Rs5,390 million and pension Rs2,085 million whereas, Rs507 million spent till now out of total Rs2,516 million allocated for union council development program, he added.
Presenting the comparison of revenue generation in last three years he said a total of Rs1,015,722 million revenue generated till April 2018, in the current year whereas, Rs1,196,847 million and Rs1,271,214 were collected during 2016-17 and 2015-16 respectively.
The mayor said that the KMC faced shortfall of Rs34,807 million in the OZT share during previous years whereas the government of Sindh had taken back revenue departments like master plan, local taxes, parking plaza saddar, bachat bazaars, charged parking, veterinary and BTS towers which had an estimated revenue collection of Rs1,810 million annually.
On this occasion, Municipal Commissioner Dr Saif-ur-Rehman said that the KMC has made a plan to make the city beautiful including the 30 major storm water drains for which cleaning campaign will start from May 11. He said work will be done on union council vice and district task force already established for this purpose.
Municipal Commissioner Dr Syed Saif-ur-Rehman, Land Committee Chairman Syed Arshad Hassan, Law Committee Chairman Arif Khan, Chairmen of other KMC council committees and head of departments were also present on this occasion.