Federal Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Minister Asad Umar has hinted that the Sindh Barrage project, which has elicited broad disapproval from stakeholders in the province, may be shelved.
“If the people’s representatives from Sindh aren’t satisfied, then why should we [the federal government] spend billions of rupees on the project,” said Umar at a press conference in Hyderabad on Saturday.
The minister was on a whirlwind visit to three districts of Hyderabad division, during which he met officers of the federal government’s organisations and addressed Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s workers in Tando Allahyar and Tando Muhammad Khan districts.
Responding to a question, he said stakeholders would be consulted through the platform of the executive committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC), where all provinces were represented.
“Obviously the federal government wants to go ahead with this project for Sindh’s people,” he remarked. “Prime Minister Imran Khan approved the project- under which the barrage’s construction is planned at a cost of Rs125 billion in Thatta district on the Indus River, extending over 180 kilometres downstream of Kotri barrage- in August, 2019.
However, the Sindh government, which had hesitantly welcomed the project, has now expressed concerns, he said, adding that the Sindh irrigation department, in particular, had raised questions on the feasibility study of the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA).
K-IV project
Umar also refuted that the Sindh government had reservations over the transfer of the K-IV water supply project for Karachi to the WAPDA. “This is wrong information. Sindh government has no objection. It rather happily transferred the project to WAPDA.
He recalled that earlier, the Center and Sindh were supposed to pool 50 percent funds for the project, but after the transfer of the project, only the Center was to fund its construction.
“The Sindh government has even submitted the papers for transfer of the project and administrative approval for the purpose has also been given. The implementation agency has also been changed,” the federal minister said.
CCI meeting
He added that the scheduled meeting of the Council of Common Interests (CCI) had been postponed because the political arena had heated up ahead of the Senate election.
The minister said the prevailing circumstances did not provide an enabling environment for CCI members to sit and talk constructively and positively. He added that the CCI would meet after the Senate elections.
“The senate elections have emerged as an outrageous business where price is fixed for conscience of the people and the conscience is also sold,” he commented while referring to leaked videos in which his party’s MPAs were seen allegedly taking bribes for their votes.
While Umar acknowledged the problem of “collective punishment”, which was being meted out to the bill-paying consumers of power distribution companies, he could not offer any short-term solution.
The punishment regime, which was introduced by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s government in 2017, approved certain hours of daily load shedding in areas on the basis of line losses. It continues unabated even after four years.
The minister said the installation of smart meters would help address this problem as the consumers not paying the bills or stealing electricity would be punished directly instead of an entire area facing the consequences.
According to him, smart meters would be installed under an Asian Development Bank’s project, in addition to another project under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
Development package
The federal minister said the PM would soon announce a development package for Sindh, along the lines of the mega-development package which was announced for Karachi last year.
Addressing a workers’ convention of the PTI in Tando Allahyar district, he said he would submit the development schemes for Sindh for approval to the PM next month.
“The PM directed me to specifically review the needs of Sindh’s people for development,” Umar said, adding that he could have planned development schemes from Sindh while sitting in Islamabad, but he preferred to visit the province to take stock of the situation and to personally know from the people their requirements.
“Remotely planned schemes often fail to produce the desired results,” he said. The minister contended that several problems continued to exist in the province because “it is being politically ruled by an elite which uses the name of Sindh and claims to love the province, but their properties are located in Dubai, England and France.”
“I want to tell you that I never feel anger on the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairperson Bilawal Bhutto Zardari. He says they haven’t received enough time to address the issues. But he perhaps does not know that his grandfather became the martial law administrator and PPP formed the government in Sindh first around 50 years ago,” the minister said.
He claimed that the PPP’s vote bank was based on love for the party and its leadership in the past. However, he added, that vote bank had now drastically shrunk.
Besides, the minister announced that soon the villages and suburbs of Tando Allahyar, which has four gas fields, would be supplied gas.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 28th, 2021.
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