http://dawn.com/2008/06/29/local1.htm

June 29, 2008 Sunday Jamadi-us-Sani 24, 1429

KARACHI: Rs37bn surplus budget for city announced

KARACHI, June 28: The proceedings of the City Council’s budget session on Saturday were marred by total chaos and disorder owing to the rumpus by opposition members, who protested against the withholding of uplift funds meant for the union councils, as City Nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal presented a Rs37.1426 billion tax-free budget, showing a surplus of Rs105.68 million.

The session was delayed for an hour due to pre-session talks held between the nazim and the opposition group leaders, which failed to bear fruit.

The session, which was presided over by Naib Nazim Nasreen Jalil, started at 6.35pm. It was adjourned by the convener to meet again at 7.20pm for the second round of talks between the nazim and the opposition leaders, but that too could not make any progress.

As soon as Mustafa Kamal started his speech, the opposition members, holding placards, drew his attention to their grievances.

The convener tried to calm down the angry opposition members and reminded them that it was a budget session and under the relevant SLGO rules, during the budget session, no other business could be conducted.

Taking the floor, opposition leaders Saeed Ghani and Rafiq Ahmed argued that they wanted to make submissions on the budget. On the request of the nazim, both the opposition leaders were allowed to submit their arguments.

Mr Ghani pointed out various ambiguities in the preparation of the budget and violations of SLGO rules. He said during the last budget session, he had also identified those violations. Agreeing with Mr Ghani’s contention, Rafiq Ahmed called for “ending discrimination in the allocation of UC funds.”

But treasury leader Masood Mehmood did not agree with the opposition’s contentions and refuted their arguments.

However, when the nazim rose to make his speech, the opposition members stood up and shouted slogans in support of their demands.

As the nazim took no notice of their protest, the opposition members tore up copies of the budget and started raising slogans of “Go nazim go,” and thumped their desks to interrupt his speech.

However, Mustafa Kamal kept reading out his speech. The chair also dismissed the objections of the opposition.

In his speech, the nazim described the CDGK’s budget for 2008-2009 as “social sector oriented,” with emphasis on health, education, environment and community welfare projects.

He said the budget of the Karachi Water & Sewerage Board, which has not been included in the city government’s budget, has seen an increase of almost Rs1.5 billion in the current year’s budget.

According to him, the government has curtailed Rs943 million in the total grant while the CDGK has had to bear an additional burden of Rs1,881 million due to the 20 per cent increase in the salaries and pensions of employees, which created a shortfall of almost Rs3 billion for the city government during the next financial year.

However, he pledged that despite resource constraints, the Haq Parast leadership would continue to serve the city without any discrimination.

According to APP, the budget envisages the highest allocation of Rs18.75 billion for development while Rs2.424 billion has been set aside for 18 towns and 178 union councils. The city government’s own resources have been indicated as major means of income besides Rs9.8 billion grants to be received from the government, Rs1 billion from the KBCA and Rs550 million to be recovered as octroi dues against the KESC.

Besides the completion of ongoing development works and new uplift projects, a major allocation of Rs10.531 billion has been made for the works and services department.

In the budget, Rs9.627 billion have been allocated for education, Rs3.556 billion for health, Rs2.465 billion for the annual development programme, Rs2.541 billion for the newly established municipal services department and Rs531.7 million for the mass transit cell.

Big mistake ... now Zardari will get a whiff of this and his goons owuld be on the city like Leeches on a deadbody.

Beta, you are talking Karachi, woh ley key to dekhayea.
Except for one seat, no other belongs to PPP.
All the decission makers are MQM, as far as Karachi goes.

And have you noticed, 531.7 Mil for Mass Transit System, so the dream lives on!

This is what NS and Zardari will be fighting over http://dawn.com/2008/06/29/local6.htm

June 29, 2008 Sunday Jamadi-us-Sani 24, 1429

MANSEHRA: Over Rs 2 bn budget for Mansehra approved
By Our Correspondent

MANSEHRA, June 28: The district council on Saturday approved Rs2.244 billion budget for the fiscal year 2008-09 with overwhelming majority.

The session was held here with convener Attiqur Rehman Jahangery in the chair. The councillors strongly opposed the huge non-developmental expenditures in the budget and asked the district nazim Mansehra to cut or minimise the proposed expenditures.

They said that if Rs1.66 billion was spent on the salaries of employees, what would be left for the victims of the October 8, 2005 earthquake and developmental works in the district.

Most of the councillors appreciated the levy of fresh taxes and proposed new taxes on petrol pumps, CNG stations, private schools, poultry farms and flourmills.

Some of the councillors, during speeches, strongly criticised the Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority (Erra), Provincial Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority (Perra) and District Reconstruction Unit, saying that the authorities failed to help the earthquake survivors to be self-reliant and restore the damaged infrastructures in health and education sectors, particularly roads and government buildings in the region.

They alleged that thousands of families were still deprived of their housing compensation instalments and they were unable to rebuild their damaged houses. They demanded establishment of an inquiry committee to unearth corruption in various government departments.

Speaking on the occasion, District Nazim Sardar Mohammad Yousaf thanked the council for approving the budget and assured the members to follow their suggestions.

10% for Zardari here http://dawn.com/2008/06/29/local2.htm

KARACHI: Finance bill adopted as budget session concludes
KARACHI, June 28: With the adoption of the Sindh Finance Bill 2008 on Saturday by the provincial assembly, the Rs 267.76 billion budget for the financial year 2008-09 was passed.

Maybe they can build more adult skills schools and universities, but I doubt that would ever happen.

Why do you doubt my friend?
In Pakistan's entirety, there's only one government that's actually working for the people.



See, what the government is giving, that amount is being allocated for education.
The rest is coming out from their own resources, for further development of Karachi.

This is sad state. one city gets this much resources and others have to die to get any. This is nothing to be proud of. In fact, it shows the poor state of resource allocation. (by the way dont feed me the karachi is the biggest trade city. The biggest foreign exchange producers has been sialkot for a long long time in term of pure production.)

furthermore there should be proper tax allocation to surrounding areas. otherwise richer city will keep getting richer and smaller city will start dying because of less infrastructure. in long run these very weakness in other city will be the start of the fall of bigger cities.

well atleast they will be spending there budget good or atleast we hope so.

Why the bitterness at Karachi getting some well deserved cash? These are funds allocated from their own resources. Government handouts are just going to education. And yes Karachi is the biggest city in Pakistan and until Gwadar and Sonmiani are complete, its the ONLY city through which all of Sialkots goodies have to go through to get to the rest of the world. There's a difference between foreign exchange production and which city is actually attracting a huge share of investment. Karachi deserves every penny it gets.

Karachi to my opinion gets lesser than what it deserves. NFC still has only population as its main criteria. That should be changed with revenue generation, inverse population, and poverty should also be present in the criteria. But again I want the provincial system abolished altogether.

Karachi needs alot of infrastructure and probably because the city government hasnt been able to get alot of projects going, there is a budget surplus. Lots of Karachiites do not even get basic necessities.

Except for the education, the rest and the surplus ammount was generated from within Karachi's own resources, and is being used for Karachi's development, I don't see anything wrong in that, all it's showing is achievement and encouragement.

Why call it "1 city"?

thats just sad, i expected better.


Please think of it as the geographical location of 1/8 of all Pakistanis reside, or 2 Crore of out the 16 Crore population.

I think its only fair that they get this amount of budget. If anything they should be getting 1/8 of the National Budget.

Please keep the anomosity against one city out of this, and look at the bigger picture, as to how many Paksitanis will be benefiting from this.

Another important fact for the record is that:-- Karachi alone contributes to 63% of the National Budget.

No one can be more Pakistani than the folks of Sind & Karachi.

Compare hardwork of Karachi Nazim with any other part of Pakistan .

Compare the Revenue Karachi generate for our Islamabad than any other city - compare the Foriegn Investment in Karachi wih any other city . Compare the HQ of multi-national companies in Karachi .

Problem is there are Funds and budgets allocated for other cities like Larkana , Sargodha , Ghotki , Khuzdar , Chaman , Gujrat or Gujranwala - BUT their elected Sardars /Wadera/ Chowdery dont have vision and sincerity to develop their own cities ... so condition remains same of above cities like it was in 1998 . Sindhi people has to ask why their leader doing nothing despite elected several time in interior Sindh .


Mustafa Kamal is working day and nights - This man is sincere to his country .. support him financially and moraly !

Mustafa Kamal has the vision of development - from 1992 to 1999 Karachi was burning - there was no release of funds for development .. now Thanks to Allah and support of Musharraf -- our city has started shinning .. !

Allah humarey Mulk Pakistan or hamarey shehr Karachi to nazre bad sey bachaey ... aur Mustafa Kamal ko mazeed Himmat aur Taqat dey .. Ameen

Thanks to MQM - for giving us such great visionary and talented NAZIM !

Watch Part 1 : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi-ghi5JOD4...feature=related

Speedray, the funds generated for Karachi, are by the mehnat of Karachites, and nothing to do with MQM yaar.
You can give credit to Small Business owners, Industrialists, entreprenuers, skilled labourers and professionals.
No doubt, some will be supporters of MQM, but doesn't mean others don't support PPP or PML.

What we've accomplished, the credit goes to Karachites, and not some political party.
The only credit MQM gets is that they utilized the funds given to them out of trust, in the most progressive and constructive way possible.

Mustapha Kamal is a good mayor, but he certainly didn't generate the funds.
It's Karachi's achievements.

Shehz both u and Speedray have valid points. Karachiites did earn the money and it wasn't due to MQM, but credit needs to be given to Mustafa Kamal for actually using that money for positive development. Otherwise Karachi was still the top earning city in the 90s but development was nil.

Dude, how could anyone (individually or as business entity) flourish if the regime or the local administration doesn't provide a good business environment? So, of course the credit does go to the local adminstration that is running the affairs of Karachi because they are the ones who formulate a plan and policy to attract investment and development in the city. I wish other city adminstration of Pakistan could follow suit.

Business environment was always there, since partition, Karachi was the first induatrialized city of Pakistan.

Karachi was always rich, the industrialist were there long before any administration took notice.
In-fact S.I.T.E is not even government, we industrialist built it, and we repair build roads there, the infrastructure, the works.
The traders were always there too, so were the jobs, so were the labourers, so was the port.
Even the hospitals and universities were privately built.

MQM has further developed the city, yeah they get all the credit.
But it's not like if they were not there Karachi's generation will decline.

The people of Karachi get the credit for the handsome generation of funds, and not some political party.
The only credit MQM gets is that they utilized the funds given to them out of trust, in the most progressive and constructive way possible.

agreed //but remove the word "only" j/k

yar Shehz bhai , problem is that karachi was generating Revenue from ages ... and handing it over to Federal Govt .. its an understood thing , is baat mey koi ikhtilaaf nahii but first time in history of Pakistan Funds are coming from Islamabad to Karachi too. this is astonishingly positive sign for mini-pakistan.


Credit goes to

• Musharraf - for releasing funds for karachi
• MQM for nominating a middle class - educated Mayor of Karachi.

actually , when some thing bad happens in karachi .. responsibility goes to mqm from whole Pakistan .. isnt it ? - whole media give negative image of mqm.

then why media hesitate to openly praise mqm when positive development occuring in karachi too by mqm mayor.

Kind of depends. In the 90's Karachi's business environment was in the dumps. And we all know who ran the show then. Prosperity occurs when both good governance and supply of funds click.

Credit goes to both the people of Karachi and the MQM.

90's ko maaf kar dey yaar, pura thread kharab ho jaey ga.

Agreed, partial (and not 'only') credit goes to MQM [j/k].
If there is a government working sincerely in Pakistan's entirety, it's MQM.
The funds given to them out of trust, were utilized in the most productive way possible, and Insha-Allah will continue.

And you're getting me wrong, I'm not blaming MQM for anything, they built my city, I'm actually gratefull.
I'm just saying credit should be given to the proper quarters.

Karachi is a multi-cultural society, with varried beliefs.
The hard working people of Karachi are all not in favour of MQM, there are supporters of various platforms.
Yet they trusted MQM to run their affairs, that's a sign of achievement in itself.
However, they, the average Karachite, are the ones who made the generation of funds available, and without those funds, development was not possible.

Agreed

^ Bro, that diagram isn't an official plan or anything endorsed by the Central or Sindh or Karachi government.


I know you used the present tense, but let's also give credit elsewhere where credit is due. T-e-I's work in Mianwali was also admirable, as was much of ML-N's work in Lahore.



Let's emulate these parties (or those representatives of these parties who were sincere) as well as the good work going on in Karachi.


Has my mouth watering.

I look forward to the day a Pakistani city has a mass transport system.

Well i dont have time to satisfy the arrogance of arising from some kind of complex that karachi people have from the "biggest" city of the pakistan. Neither do i have the energy to point out that i was saying that more money should be diverted to the surrounding areas of karachi rather than karachi. I also dont have enough patience to explain that when the foreign exchange earning industry of pakistan going to die, karachi will only have p|ss to send through its harbors.

But then again even if i do pin point every single little thing, I have seen the tendency of people over here to just keep blowing their own horn even when the reality is right into their face.

But forget that i ever asked to spend more money in areas surrounding karachi........... Son your apprx 65% of industrial earning is from textile. Guess where it is located and facing the destruction because of no attention. (i am not blaming any province or city for that. I am pakistani first then anyone else). Your factories are folding and going to bangladesh. tomorrow when faisalabad will say fuc|( this sh|t our money and our tax will stay in our city, imagine where your karachi, islamabad, lahore will go.

Most of your fans and motor industry is set up in gujranwalla to Gujrat. Gujrat also is the biggest exporter of shoes fans motors etc. i wonder what if they start asking for their tax money?????????????

By the way I also condemned the construction of a new airport in islamabad while saying that city like mirpur kharian jhelum and gujrat may use an international airport which will be much useful for income generation and public transportation. Funny, no one called me having hard feeling to islamabad at that time but god forbid if i say the similar thing about the allocation of resources when it comes to karachi.

You know what, rather than telling me things, you guys might wanna think about your hypocrisy. You know what come to think of it, jhelum gives 10 million everyday as tax money and i am talking about the figure in early 90s. Its about time that people at jhelum start seeing at least half of that money cause we also deserve every single penny of it.

CDGK officials grease their own palms selling petrol?

By Jamil Khan

KARACHI: Over a dozen officials at the city government’s Nishtar Road workshop have for at least the last five months sold in the open market thousands of liters of petrol and diesel reserved for CDGK vehicles, Daily Times learnt on Wednesday.
They have allegedly done this by giving less fuel to the CDGK vehicles. For example, they have given fumigation vehicles nearly 50 percent less fuel. “The 20 new vehicles reserved for fumigation have been allocated 80 liters but were given only 35 to 40 liters of diesel,” alleged an insider who did not want to be mentioned. “The remaining fuel has been sold in the open market at higher prices.”
The CDGK workshop is located on Nishtar Road and was used by the defunct KMC (Karachi Metropolitan Corporation) for a long time. After SLGO 2001 came into effect, the city government took charge and started using it to service the over 200 vehicles from Lyari and Saddar towns and those from three departments - veterinary, municipal public health (fumigation) and electric and mechanical.
Sources said that the problem was with a grade 5 officer, MA, who had been (reportedly) verbally given charge of grade 16 work by the EDO Health and other officials close to the City Nazim Secretariat. MA has been issuing orders in the capacity of an assistant district officer transport in the motor vehicle section at the workshop. Also, unrelated to the workshop, he has allegedly also been acting as a chief sanitary inspector to 170 staffers deputed at Shahrah-e-Faisal.
Azhar Abbas, the general secretary of the KMC Peoples Workers Union, told Daily Times that they had tried to lodge complaints against the officials but neither the EDO Health nor the officials at the City Nazim’s Secretariat listened to them. When Daily Times contacted EDO Health Dr A.D. Sanjnani, he refuted the allegations and said he had not issued any such orders.
Daily Times spent a long time trying to reach officer MA at the workshop but with no luck.
Workers at the workshop also complained that their pay was being cut. The cleaners for Shahra-e-Faisal said the same: “For the last three months, I had never been absent from duty at Shahrah-e-Faisal but every month I have been receiving Rs 2,000 less in my salary,” said S Masih, one cleaner, adding that other sanitary workers had the same problem. He said it was being done the “new chief sanitary inspector”.
There are other goings on at the workshop as well, the workers said. They claimed that a truck loaded with fumigation medicine had been sold on Wednesday. At around 1:45 p.m. a blue truck bearing the number plate EKD-738 was loaded with 20 sacks full of anti-mosquito medicine before it left the vicinity of the CDGK Store adjacent to the workshop. “The medicine worth Rs 1.2 million has been sold and will be dumped in a warehouse in Korangi Industrial Area,” claimed one of the officials, who did not want to be named. He said that three days ago, one of the officials at the workshop had sold six barrels of crude oil to a private firm even though it was meant to be used for the fumigation drive.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?p...3-7-2008_pg7_55

Somebody will say that the newspapers is so and so. I love all cities of Pakistan. They are equal to me, I myself born and lived long time in Karachi and know in and out of Karachi ( a great city in deed. ).

You're right, I am speaking in the present, I refuse to dwell in the past anymore, and repeat for another 6 months 'welcome to the 90's' or 'I told you so'. Or repeat like a parrot events that didn't happen in the long march or Muree/Timbuktu declaration.

PML-N was a national party, and ignored cities which could have done wonders for Punjab, they didn't.
ML-N did a great job for Raiwind, and then Lahore.
MQM is a small regional party, and worked for every constituency that imposed faith in them, including Lyari.

Pakistan's priority was to link the entire country through effective road network, to Karachi Port.
Remember, little over a year ago we were all still talking about motorways linking Punjab Motorways under construction?
Sindh Government completed their side of the commitment and delivered that highway, all the way to Balauchistan and Punjab. Even The MCH to Gawadar is complete.
Punjab government hasn't even linked Sialkot, Gujranwala, Multan, and Faislabad together yet, and gave priority to Lahore Islamabad motorway, so democrats can reach their homes faster. The cities that earn (in Punjab) are Faisalabad, Multan, Sialkot, Gujranwala, etc., and not Lahore and Islamabad, where is the parity?

Be it ML-N or ML-Q or ML-F or ML-J, Punjab government never bothered to develop their own cities.
Sindh Government, on the other hand, gives priority to development.
Sindh Government never cared, really, about building roads for any single Minister either, unless they were in a major city, like Sukkur, Mir Pur Khas, Hyderabad, etc.

Both governments have different set of priorities.
However, in the Federal budget, Sindh actually receives less, and develops more, where does Punjab budget dissapear to?
MQM does a lot more work as a regional party, than any other national party has ever done given the opportunities.
And that's the disparity I was actually referring to, not trying to take the little work they did comparitively.

Bhai jaan, rehnay bhi dain.

My point exactly:

You're showing the Punjab vs Sindh attitude that crops up so easily in these discussions.

Yes, the Punjab government has failed miserably to develop to the extent it should have. The Sindh government has done comparitively better. Point being both governments should learn from the works of the other. Which was what my original quote was all about.

That's the irony, they aren't.
100 days, long marches, and destruction of public property is the song of the hour.

And it's not Punjab Vs. Sindh attitute, the progress that we don't see as much, but grants a higher ammount in the budget, I'd like to see a break-up, where do those funds dissapear to.

It's my right to demand, it's my taxes, where are those highways that were supposed to link Multan-Faisalabad-Sialkot-Gujranwala-Jehlum-to Lahore and Islamabad? Where is that motorway that will link these cities to the highway connecting Sindh?

I'm happy that one government is working well, and disheartened that another isn't, there's no comparision attitude.
And I'm glad that the government that's working hard, are running the affairs of my city, that's all.

Fair enough bro, it's a valid point.