Flyovers and traffic: Angry taskmaster wants Malir 15 and Halt diversion routes done before Ramzan

Pedestrian bridge expected to go up by tomorrow, commissioner told.

KARACHI: “You have to do it by the 19th,” says Karachi Commissioner Shoaib Siddiqui. He is referring to the diversion route for the Malir flyovers during a 1pm coordination meeting at his office on Thursday. Ramazan is around the corner. Traffic is a mess. People are fed up.

“Sir...” The contractor, Shakoor Paleejo of Kainatt Enterprises, starts to explain.

“Sunain meri baat,” the commissioner cuts him off.

“Sir.”

The difference between the two ‘Sirs’ - one a plea, the other resigned submission - tells the story of the challenges undertaking public works in a city like Karachi pose. Technically the construction of the two flyovers , at Malir 15 and Malir Halt, should be overseen by Karachi Administrator Rauf Farooqui. But a staffer at the commissioner’s office said that the chief minister asked him to step in to help get the work done. One of the commissioner’s strengths is getting everyone around the table to sort out glitches. In reality though, he whips everyone into submission. Perhaps this is a good thing in Karachi where, left to their own devices, contractors and KMC officials would take forever. Or worse, there is a danger of a Clifton happening.

At the outset of the meeting the commissioner ran through a list of problems they had discussed last week at their third session. He wanted a conclusive, confident reply that the water had been drained from the site. At this spot, Sharae Faisal had standing water up till three days ago. As much as one of the officials on the project wanted to assure it had been drained, it appeared that a nullah from Malir was still causing problems. The director-general of the city government’s technical services, Niaz Soomro, tried to persuade that this was a separate problem; some cross sewage connections have yet to be taken care of. The traffic police’s DSP Faaiz Ali Shigri for Sharae Faisal East countered this by saying that the reality was that some water was still standing.

Foremost on the commissioner’s mind, though was ensuring that the diversion route is opened by June 19 on the dot. The project has been delayed five months. It is supposed to be done by September.

The problem has been what government calls encroachments (as if they have no right to be there). This includes paan cabins, fruit sellers, carts offering lemonade and refreshments to commuters. On the Azeempura side at Al Falah road they were removed around a mosque but keep cropping up. It didn’t help that men came in the middle of the night and dug up part of the road for cables without the city staff finding out. All of this delayed the creation of the diversion route. To make matters worse the city shut down for three days.

But most of all, it was an electricity pole that supplied a mosque that needed to be removed. “Angels aren’t going to come at night and remove it,” said the commissioner. We went three times, said one official, but couldn’t get the job done. The deadline for this is June 12. The police were ordered to protect the K-Electric staff so the work could continue. In fact, there are more poles that need to be relocated.

Most of the representatives from the water board, police, KMC etc knew better than to mention problems or say anything other than they’d get the job done. But contractor Paleejo made the mistake of being honest. There are cabins, thella wallahs, a mosque, official quarters by the railway lines that are all coming in the way of the diversion route and completing the construction, he said. “They are glossing over the problems,” he added, referring to all the assurances the other people at the table had given. He seemed to be trying to say that not everything was hunky dory.

“Kaam lene ke shoq me tender na lain,” the commissioner told him off. All his protests were silenced. Siddiqui ordered him to meet the KMC managers daily at the chief implementation cell. As far as the commissioner is concerned, the contractor didn’t get to gripe if he took on the job. And as Paleejo used to work in city government, he knew people and how the system worked. “Justify your existence,” the commissioner nearly shouted, threatening to blacklist him. This was a classic case of a lack of will, coordination and supervision, as far as he saw it.

And so, the meeting ended with some issues resolved and others not. For whatever it is worth, each stakeholder is working to try to get the work done before Ramzan. They have less than a month. The commissioner is watching.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 6^th, 2014.