Mayor wants city’s NFC Award share paid directly to KMC

Karachi Mayor Wasim Akhtar has demanded of Prime Minister Imran Khan to give Karachi and Hyderabad’s share in the National Finance Commission (NFC) Award directly to the municipal administrations of the two cities.

“The Sindh government has completely failed to deliver,” he said, adding that the misuse of 18th amendment by the provincial administration has destroyed the two major cities. Talking to the media while inspecting the cleaning work of Gujjar Nullah on Thursday, the mayor deplored that the Sindh government was not releasing the funds allocated for developmental work in Karachi and Hyderabad.

“The federal government must give the share of Karachi and Hyderabad in the NFC Award directly to the local body institutions of the two cities so that the basic civic and municipal problems of the people can be resolved, since the provincial administration is not willing to give it in the Provincial Finance Commission.”

He said that the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) had launched a massive operation to clean all the major storm-water drains in the city before the advent of the monsoon season. “However, there will be no use of cleaning drains until the Sindh government ensures that all of Karachi’s garbage is shifted to the landfill sites on the outskirts of the city.”

The mayor said that the city’s storm-water drains were being cleaned and de-silted on an emergency basis due to the upcoming wet weather and the cleaning work of Gujjar Nullah had been completed.

“But this is not a permanent solution to the problem. The drains are now cleaned twice a year,” he said, adding that the problem would persist even if the drains were cleaned four times in a year.

Akhtar said that the real solution to save drains from choking was the proper disposal of garbage that was frequently thrown in the drains. He pointed out that the Sindh government was responsible for lifting municipal solid waste in the city, but it had failed to perform the job.

The mayor said the provincial government was already not interested in solving the problems of the people, lamenting that a meagre amount was allocated for Karachi in the federal budget.

He appealed to the prime minister to immediately announce a special package for the development and uplift of Karachi, warning that the entire country would be impacted if the city’s problems were not solved.

The mayor also said that he would ask the MNAs of his party to review the party’s alliance with the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf in case no attention was given to the problems of Karachi.