Karachi’s unending woes

City that accounts for 65% of national, 75% of provincial revenues continues to suffer neglect in terms of governance

With the advent of the monsoon season, Karachiites start dreading to think of inundated roads, breakdown of sewage system and power failure. But Karachi’s woes are not just rain-related. The city is also suffering from serious water, electricity and gas crises as well as street crimes and mushrooming illegal settlements. Besides, it has an undocumented population of 30 million, representing many ethnic segments of Pakistan.

But the city that accounts for 65% of national and 75% of provincial revenues continues to suffer neglect in terms of governance. The city’s current Mayor, Murtaza Wahab of the PPP, lacks legitimacy, as he was not fairly “elected” given that the number game favoured the joint JI-PTI candidate, Hafiz Naeemur Rehman. Thus, the Mayor does not enjoy the mandate to govern the city that is suffering from a host of civic issues.

In a debate in Sindh Assembly on July 24, Sindh Local Government Department Parliamentary Secretary Salim Baloch informed the house members that “at present the water requirement of the city is 1,200 million gallons per day (mgd), however, only 600 mgd is available from two government water sources.” These sources are river Indus and Hab dam. Baloch also told the house that Karachi will continue to face acute water shortage unless the mega water supply project, called K-IV, is completed. The project to provide 500 mgd water to Karachi from Keenjher lake which is around 100 km from the city has been pending since 2006. The actual cost of K-IV was Rs50 billion, but has now reached a whopping Rs250 billion.

The gap of 600 mgd in water supply to Karachi from an actual demand of 1,200 mgd is further aggravated because of water theft, illegal connections, water loss from pipelines and money-minting by the notorious tanker mafia. And the irony is that while Karachiites — well an overwhelming majority of them — are not supplied with the required amount of water, they do get water bills pretty regularly. Furthermore, no government has been able to eradicate the tanker mafia because influential persons are behind the illegal business which compels the citizens of Karachi to pay Rs22 billion annually on purchase of water, according to estimates.

Furthermore, Karachiites are forced to pay for expensive electricity supplied by K-Electric which has a monopoly over production and distribution of electricity in the mega city. The recent Rs7 per unit hike in the power tariff will increase the per unit cost of electricity to Rs50 for those in the upper slabs. K-Electric’s performance has nothing much to write home about as it has failed to control line losses, upgrade its distribution system, and tackle unabated loadshedding, thus making the lives of citizens miserable. Allowing K-Electric to continue to function for another six months, despite its poor performance, reflects how deeply-entrenched the mafias are in this country.

Karachi’s predicament doesn’t end at the water and electricity crises. It has a serious law and order breakdown where criminal gangs under the patronage of influential people roam freely; corruption and kickbacks in infrastructure projects produces low-quality work; and absence of competent, honest and hardworking local government gives enormous space to mafias to continue with their loot and plunder.

Will the citizens of Karachi continue to suffer these ordeals or there is light at the end of the tunnel? One can figure out three solutions to mitigate the sufferings of Karachiites.

First, when neither the provincial nor the federal government is interested in dealing with Karachi’s problems, the solution only lies with the citizens. In view of corruption and nepotism under the patronage of those who matter, one cannot have high hopes from the controversial head of the city. The residents are forced to take it upon themselves to look after repair of roads and sewage system, through mobilisation of human and financial resources. There is no dearth of philanthropists in Karachi who are willing to contribute towards the betterment of city provided there is no corruption and nepotism. The Sindh government, during its rule spanning 15 years, is blamed for destroying Karachi in terms of civic work. Projects like metro bus, costing billions of rupees, are still incomplete because of slow pace of work and lack of professionalism.

Second, foreign donors like Asian Development Bank should now refuse to fund any project of Sindh government because of its poor performance, corruption, kickbacks and nepotism. A couple of years ago, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) was interested in launching mass urban transport system for Karachi. Unfortunately, the lack of interest on the part of Sindh government compelled JICA to move the project from Karachi to Dhaka where it has recently invested $984.6 million to complete a metro train. Unless those wielding power are responsible, capable and serious, one cannot expect any foreign funding for modernisation of city’s infrastructure? What matters is reputation and credibility of the government which in case of Karachi is highly contested. If the Sindh government borrows from external sources for completing infrastructure projects and fails to deliver, donors will not respond positively in future.

Third, professional and educated elite of Karachi, regardless of their political affiliations, must get untied and compel federal, provincial and local governments to change their attitude towards Karachi’s legitimate issues. If they fail to respond then the real stakeholders of Karachi should consider not paying taxes because their resources either end up in personal bank accounts of mafias or are used to conduct substandard work.

Unless the citizens of Karachi take matters in their own hands, there is hardly any likelihood of a qualitative change to mitigate the sufferings of people of this mega city.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 1^st, 2023.

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