Encroachments in Karachi, Becoming an Environmental Demon

With  the span of time encroachments across the metropolitan area has become a major nuisance in Karachi. Although, it is still not a permanent feature but surely look an unsolved and endless problem because of various reason. Many anti-encroachments drives at large and small scale have been carried out but every time these bothersome settlements resurfaced after their temporary disappearance.

There is no denying the numbers of running vehicles including cars and motorcycles is on the rise in the city however, analysts believe the roadside encroachments are the main factor, which has made the Karachi' traffic and environs outright chaotic. And, these encroachments have increased over the years because of two reasons The first is the sizable growth of commercial and residential activities in the city and the second is the deliberate lethargy on behalf of the civic authorities to let these illegal settlements unchecked.

Encroachments have turned today into a big mafia generating billions of illicit rupees annually, which is the actual reason for inaction on behalf of civic authorities. Police, traffic authorities, the KMC and Cantonments staff  remain irrelevant to take any action against these encroached settlements in their respective areas and in return they are paid with hefty monetary benefits to let them blossom.

Just take the example of Sadder, Karachi. According to a recent reports a sizable amount of Rs. 450 million is collected monthly from the encroachment mafia of the town. In Sadder town there are reportedly thousands of regularised or legal shops, bound to pay government taxes and utilities charges regularly, benefitting state exchequer. However, there are much bigger numbers of irregular or illegal small business establishments where thousands of people come daily to shop old and new goods in cheap rates. These small business establishments is said to be nearly one lac in number only in Sadder Karachi, which include modular stalls, moving carts, footpath shops, roadside vendors and makeshift markets. Instead of paying any utility and tax charges, they just pay Rs. 150 daily at individual capacity for their space, which become Rs. 45 crore in total in a month, distributed in area police, traffic police and KMC authorities.  

The impacts of these encroachments and their illegitimate space are hazardous. Not only they occupy the roads which cause severe traffic jam and obstacles for pedestrians, but they also badly affect the environment and public health of the area, besides depriving government from a sizable revenue.

Though, the issue of road encroachments, particularly by vendors also a human face too, but urban experts are firmed that encroachment is a big problem in Karachi and is directly linked to traffic congestion. These businesses are a big nuisance as they seriously hamper traffic. According to the traffic police there are 26 "choke points" in the city where encroachments have made traffic management almost impossible. They include portions of Shahra e Faisal, M.R. Kiyani Road, Chand Bibi Road, Yaqoob Khan Road, Agha Khan III Road, Dr. Daudpota Road, Abdullah Haroon Road, Mansfield Street, Preedy Street, M.A. Jinnah Road, Nawab Siddiq Ali Khan Road, Business Recorder Road and S.M. Taufeeq Road. It is basically the responsibility of the traffic police and also the respective land-owning agencies to act against encroachments, develop proper parking places and implement them strictly.

Development and success of any mass transit project requires space' clearance and smoothness which is linked with removal of all kind of encroachments. The government must realise that making flyovers and underpasses cannot become a successful solution to improving traffic flow as the problem exists somewhere else.

By

Editorial, Infocus 

The 100-day Cleanliness Drive exposes City Mayor' futility.

After taking over the reign of city government, the elected Mayor Waseem Akhtar has so far appeared  legitimately unable and logically incapable to deliver the goods. Compared to his predecessors he has not given any significant performance and really exposed himself as an aimless rather powerless authority. However, for that he has to blame himself.

When the new Mayor took the oath some nine months ago he knew his limitations in terms of finances and administration. He should have realised that as the head of the city' premier civic body he first had to made his Corporation revenue-wise sustainable and functionally viable because in the absence of funding from provincial government for development works and municipal services, neither he nor the KMC can perform smartly. But instead in a hurry, he announced a 100-days cleanliness drive in city being fully aware of his capacity and resources. The result, the drive hardly bore any fruit after the completion of tenure today.      

 Mounts of garbage can be seen throughout the city. Almost all the main thoroughfares of the city, internal roads, green belts expose the un-removed garbage and wastes which is further growing on daily basis. Garbage bins are missing in streets and trash material was open before residents and commuters. The conditions of public and street parks are extremely pathetic and their serenity has gone away. The municipal performance of KMC was badly exposed in rainfall during December when the city was remained flooding with rain water for several days.

Not a single insecticide spray drive was carried out in the city because of which mosquitoes and other insects are rampant and causing diseases. Thousands of cases of Chickungunya were reported only in Malir for which hundreds of people lost their lives. Similarly in a sizable quantity, patients suffering from dengue fever and malaria can seen waiting in queue in every single clinic and hospital for medication and treatments. Overall the city is currently miles away from any health and hygiene standards

Several bitten cases from rabid dogs have been reported but the KMC never attempted any move to counter the rabid dogs and other infected animals. In four DMCs namely Central, South, Korangi and East citizens are reportedly feared rabid dogs in large quantity and complained several times to concerned authorities but no action has been taken.

Interestingly, when the KMC authorities foresaw that their 100-day cleanliness drive would not meet to success, they backtracked from their words and claimed that the drive was limited to a handful of selected Union Councils rather the entire city. Their excuse is hardly unacceptable.   

There is no doubt under the new Sindh Local Government Ordinance lots of civil functions has been taken away from the city administration and the powers of the city Mayor has been sizably curtailed. But still there are a lot of duties and responsibilities before him to perform and to assert his authority. The cleanliness drive from the new Mayor was a deliberate move to assert his authority. But to be honest, for the failure of cleanness drive the city mayor cannot be given any clean chit.  

By

Editorial, Infocus

The sorry state of Karachi' Fire Brigade

On Feb 28, 2017, the President of Pakistan approved the Fire Safety Provision, 2016 Building Code of Pakistan. The new building code -- jointly prepared by the Pakistan Engineering Council and the National Disaster Management Authority -- envisages to ensure the installation of fire prevention and control systems in all high-rise residential and commercial buildings in the country. However, it is an open secret how much our public institutions have been well enough to implement the ongoing fire safety bylaws but more unfortunately when one looks at the governmental side, where fire rescue service is municipally a local government affair and responsibility, there seems very gloomy picture.

At a time when nearly all cities, including Karachi is in state of emergency to confront terror threat and disaster-like situation, it's inhabitants might not get quick response for rescue services from Karachi Municipal Corporation's fire brigade department owing multifaceted problems like water shortage, power outages and required expenses for fuel and maintenance of tenders. The Fire Brigade Department of KMC is in deplorable conditions with most of machineries are non-operational due to negligence of higher authorities.

According to official reports, there are 22 to 26 Fire Stations in Karachi in which more than half do not fit in the description of Fire Station.  Some are one-room offices with a parking area for fire tender. Some run their affairs make-shift under-the=bridge occupancy. Other are operated out of make-shift containers. While out of total 75 fire tenders only 45 are commutable or functional.

The department has four water browsers, large tankers to hold up capacity of 30,000 gallon water. But as the contract of their drivers is expired there is nobody to drive these heavy tankers so these browsers are getting rusty day by day.  Similarly, out of four snorkel only one is functional, besides a single rescue vehicle which is used for all kind of calamities in the city.

Furthermore, the Corporation doesn't have adequate quantity of fire extinguisher foam to put out a fire in a single oil truck. Almost all the fire stations do not have required fire extinguisher foam and even a few of them have it, it is less than 100 cans. While, according to required standards each fire station should have a thousand cans of fire extinguisher.

It is also important to mention that according to international standards, there should be one fire station for every 0.1 million people. This means that Karachi needs atleast 200 fully equipped fire stations within it's vicinity. But the city as said above only have a dozen proper fire stations. The international response time of fire tenders should not be more than three minutes, but we all well aware fire tenders take a lot of time to reach any emergency situation.

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Editorial, Infocus