Local government elections: Political parties try to woo voters

PML-N tries to cash in on successful projects, opposition parties stress on govt’s failings.

RAWALPINDI: Ahead of the local government election, political parties are venturing out to try and bag as many votes as they can, with ruling party candidates trying to cash in on recent projects in Rawalpindi, while the opposition tries to highlight the PML-N’s failure in addressing problems such as provision of clean drinking water, sanitation, health and other issues during its last seven years of running Punjab province.

Residents remarked that governments’ false promises have become a norm. “These issues have been prevalent for the past one-and-a-half decade and will persist for decades to come,” said Shahid Anwar, a resident of Gulzar-e-Quaid. He insisted that the city lacks everything including honest and hardworking planners.

Talking about the issues in Rawalpindi, Fahd Rizwan, a doctoral student, said deforestation and deteriorating infrastructure were the prime concerns.

“The residents are confronted with serious environmental pollution, deforestation, an increasing population and lack of planning to improve the living standards at local level…. these issues need to be focused on,” Rizwan said.

He insisted that almost all political parties were aware of the issues but either lacked solutions to the problem, or interest in them.

Residents and political leaders indicated that the limited availability of clean drinking water was a prime concern.

The issue has persisted for the past 15 years. Residents are supplied with contaminated water through broken supply lines, which WASA recently demanded Rs31 million to replace.

“In the mid 90s we had around 85 tube-wells, now we have over 400 in the city, but residents still do not have enough water for daily use,” said a Water and Sanitation Department official.

The deteriorating sewage system is another issue. Clogged and overflowing lines in almost every locality speak volumes about the performance of the district administration and the elected representatives of the city.

Elected members of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf claim the provincial government is not releasing their funds, nor is the district government accepting project proposals in their constituencies.

“We have not been given a single penny…we can show the project proposals which are pending with the district government,” said Member Provincial Assembly (MPA) Arif Abbasi. He said residents across the city could get clean drinking water if Rs10 billion out of the Rs53 billion being spent on the Metro-Bus project were spent on waterworks.

Meanwhile, Awami Workers Party (AWP) will for the first time try its luck in the local bodies election. “We will definitely highlight these issues, and are trying to find ways to resolve them,” assured Aasim Sajjad Akhtar, a central leader of the party.

He said meetings are being held and experts were engaged to sort out how to improve service delivery system. AWP will focus on equipping basic health units, providing facilities at schools and long-term planning to ensure the availability of clean drinking water, he said.

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Hanif Abbasi said that 60 per cent issues of the city including transport, health and education have been resolved. “We have built some big hospitals and upgraded schools. The metro buses will soon be operational. Now we will focus on union councils,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 20^th, 2015.