Tenders for two water schemes to be floated soon

Minister tells PA govt doing its best to ensure there’s no water shortage in city this summer

Karachi

The Sindh Assembly was informed on Wednesday that tenders for two new water supply projects in Karachi having a capacity of 165 millions gallons daily (MGD) would be floated this month.

“The provincial government is doing its best to ensure that the residents of Karachi don’t face a water shortage crisis this summer,” local government minister Jam Khan Shoro told the House on a privilege motion moved by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf MPA Khurrum Sher Zaman.

The opposition lawmaker of the PTI moved the privilege motion on the basis of his resolution passed by the assembly on 16 February calling for early start of work on the two new bulk water supply schemes.

The minister said the tender for constructing one of the projects having a capacity of 65 MGD would be floated on April 21. The tender for the other scheme that has a capacity of 100 MGD would be floated on April 29.

Later, work on laying the two water supply lines will formally start.

The minister said the contract for building the K-IV Greater Karachi water supply scheme had been awarded to the Frontier Works Organisation and it would be completed in two years.

“The chief minister and the provincial cabinet has approved the awarding of the contract to the FWO,” he added.

He said the chief minister had also released Rs200 million for the repair of the old machinery of the Dhabeji pumping station near Karachi. A scheme for the revival of the Dhabeji station had also been approved.

Shoro said the completion of the K-IV project and two other water supply schemes would help in meeting the existing water demand and supply gap in Karachi.

He added that he was personally supervising the work on these schemes.

On the minister’s assurance, the PTI MPA agreed to withdraw his privilege motion.

 

Token walkout

Earlier, MPA Khurrum Sher Zaman staged a token walkout from the house as despite several attempts, speaker Agha Siraj Durrani did not allow him to raise the issue of awarding of a tender to a private firm involving Rs60 million without conduting the tendering process in violation of the Sindh Public Procurement Regulatory Authority rules.

The PTI lawmaker tried to raise the issue as a “short-notice question” pertaining to the excise and taxation department before the formal start of the question hour of the day’s proceedings.

Excise and taxation minister Gayan Chand Essarani assured the House that he would look into the issue raised by the PTI MPA.

 

Two lawmakers take oath

Muhammad Ismail Rahu, who is also the Sindh president of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, and Pakistan Peoples Party’s Ziaul Hassan Lanjar, took oath as newly returned MPAs.

Rahu was elected as an MPA from PS-59 Badin while Lanjar secured the PS-23 Naushahro Feroz seat. Rahu is likely to become the new parliamentary party leader of PML-N in the assembly. The position was earlier held by Irfanullah Khan Marwat before he was unseated from the House.

 

Privilege motion report

The assembly’s committee on rules of procedure and privileges headed by parliamentary affairs minister Nisar Ahmed Khuhro presented its report on a privilege motion moved by Pakistan People’s Party MPA Shahid Abdul Salam Thahim.

The MPA had moved his privilege motion against Dr Abdul Majeed Chutto, the then project director/vice chairman of the Board of Governors of the Shahdad Pur Institute of Medical Sciences (SIMS), for misbehaving with him during a meeting on September 30, 2014.

The privilege committee recommended in its report imposing a week-long symbolic imprisonment with a fine of Rs5,000 on Chutto.

The committee directed that its recommendations should be conveyed to the chief secretary for implementation.

It report read, “Since the mentioned officer (Dr Chutto) was not fit for the government service or to hold any public office due to his arrogant attitude towards public representatives, therefore no further posting be allowed to him.”

Syed Sardar Ahmed and Nand Kumar, the parliamentary leaders of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional respectively, opposed the penal action against the former project director of SIMS saying that it was too harsh for somebody associated with the medical profession and he had served the people of his native area.

Ahmed said the adoption of such recommendations of a privilege committee would further accentuate the VIP culture in the province.

MQM female lawmakers Sumeta Afzal Syed and Heer Soho said the provincial assembly as per its rules should hold a proper discussion on the quarterly reports submitted earlier by the finance department on state of spending of provincial budget for the ongoing financial year 2015-16.

Finance minister Murad Ali Shah said that one such quarterly report on behalf of the finance department would be submitted in a few days. He proposed that the assembly should allocate one week from April 25 during the current session for holding a debate on the financial reports.  Later, the speaker adjourned the house till April 8 (Friday).