Though the chief minister – during the assembly session – described the merits of the North Sindh Urban Services Corporation (NSUSC) established under Sindh Cities Improvement Programme (SCIP), the poverty-stricken citizens would definitely be shocked when the newly-established corporation properly starts functioning, as the Sindh government will impose a utility tax on provision of municipal services, similar to that taxed by the City District Government Karachi (CDGK).
While presenting the three-year performance of the provincial government, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah said that NSUSC has began its operations and under Phase-I, taken over the control of water supply, sewerage and solid waste management services in six cities of north Sindh. This will be followed by another cluster of cities in central Sindh covering Nawabshah, Moro, Shahdadpur, Hala, Sanghar and Dadu.
An interesting fact behind this whole episode is, however, that in 2009 the Sindh government had inked an agreement of at least $300 million to ensure funding for the SCIP, under which the provincial government had to carry out infrastructure development in major cities of the province. A new infrastructure/development levy would be imposed and collected to undertake maintenance of cities’ infrastructure with the main focus being water supply, wastewater and solid waste management.
Initially, the programme was launched in Larkana, Sukkur, Rohri, Shikarpur and Khairpur districts and had to be expanded into other districts at a later stage, which the chief minister explained in his presentation. The project is being funded by the World Bank (WB) at a total cost of $300 million in five instalments. The first instalment of $38 million was provided to the Sindh government in 2009.
Under the programme, the citizens would be bound to pay the utility charges for facilities provided by town municipal administrations (TMAs) such as water supply and waste management. While the Programme Support Unit has been set up, the formation of Urban Planning Unit and NSUSC had to take place.
The NSUSC would work under the TMA concerned and would issue utility bills including infrastructure and development taxes to residential, commercial and amenities units every month. However, the utility tariff would be decided later.