Prime Minister Imran Khan’s flying visit to Karachi brought good news to the country’s largest city, but while his remarks about the development package for the city would be welcome, they revived a spirit of partisanship that would actually work against purpose of the development programme, which was to bring relief to the citizens of that city, not provide its citizens additional facilities.
The fact that the PPP provincial government had not yet inaugurated a number of projects, nor completed the sewage and road projects should not disguise the fact that the city has avoided the kind of devastation this monsoon as that last year, which had prompted the development package. By ordering implementation through the federal government, he will only revive the controversy that started last year, when the federal and provincial governments engaged in a tug o’ war over who was to control the projects.
Mr Khan should remember that the projects are meant to benefit the people of Karachi, not the particular PTI MNA or MPA through whose constituency a project might pass. He would be well-advised to remember his own dicta about public representatives needing to hold public money as a sacred trust. The Karachi Transformation Package involved large sums, and when such projects are contracted out, contractors are not just willing to pay to be awarded the contract, but public representatives are too often willing to exert their undoubted influence for a consideration. Elected officials are not in it only for the money, but also have an interest in how far a project will influence the voters. With elections now firmly on the horizon, as the PTI heads towards the completion of the third year in its five-year term, it would be inevitable that public representatives would be inclined to make this federal money count for them. As Mr Khan intends to campaign in 2023 in interior Sindh, for which he has appointed ex-CM Arbab Ghulam Rahim as SAPM, he will need to show that his party can deliver, and that means keeping the local leadership of Karachi in check.
