CS has failed to run system of province, says Sher Zaman

Following a meeting with the provincial chief secretary on Thursday in which a Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) delegation asked him about the status of thousands of pending complaints filed with the Prime Minister’s citizen portal by people of Sindh, PTI Karachi president Khurrum Sher Zaman launched into a torrent of criticism against chief secretary Syed Mumtaz Ali Shah in a media talk.

“The Sindh chief secretary has failed to run the system of the province,” said Zaman, who led the PTI delegation which comprised lawmakers of the PTI, which has its opposition leader in the Sindh Assembly.

Talking to the media, Zaman said 51,000 complaints filed by people of the province had been pending with the Pakistan Citizen Portal and the CS had failed to resolve them.

Lashing out at the chief secretary, he said they wanted to know “if the CS was answerable to the PM or not”. The PTI Karachi president said they would inform the prime minister that the chief secretary posted in the province had not been working efficiently.

It is pertinent to mention here that the federal government has tasked the provincial CS with resolving complaints being filed by the people of Sindh with the Pakistan Citizen Portal, an online platform allowing the citizens to instantly file complaints.

Talking to the media, the PTI Karachi president blasted the Sindh government too, saying that “all ministers in Sindh are incompetent”. He said both the past and present local government ministers in Sindh were responsible for numerous unresolved municipal issues in the province for which “they should be put behind the bars”. He said thousands of illegal buildings had been constructed in Karachi.

Talking about the provincial health department, he alleged that apart from the government-run hospitals in Karachi, the public health facilities in the rest of the province did not dispense medicines to their patients.

The public health facilities in Larkana, which is the political support base of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party, did not have vaccine required for the treatment of dog-bite victims, he said, adding that the public health sector had been in a shambles in the province.

Zaman said Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah had been keeping the portfolio of finance minister with him but he had been unable to provide relief to the people. Speaking on the occasion, PTI Karachi General Secretary Saeed Afridi said deputy commissioners posted in different districts of the province had not been cooperating with lawmakers.

He said the deputy commissioners had been unable to stop the incidents of land grabbing and instances of profiteering by retailers. It is pertinent to mention here that the office of the chief secretary did not issue any statement on the meeting or the PTI delegation’s criticism till the filing of this story.