KARACHI: Despite claims made by Mayor Karachi, Wasim Akhtar and his party members about shortage of funds and lack of authority, it has been learnt that the Sindh government pays at least Rs57.26 billion every year for district Karachi alone.
The Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) which is led by the city’s mayor also controls the district administration with the district chairman also a member of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM). However, the issue of ensuring civic facilities to the city remains unresolved.
“The budget figures show that KMC and District Municipal Corporations DMCs are getting a large amount of funding from the provincial government yet no progress has been registered in any district.”, a senior official of the KMC told Pakistan Today.
Out of the six districts which constitute Karachi only two have non-MQM chairmen (Malir and South have Pakistan People’s Party-led administrations), while all other districts fall under the control of MQM.
The sources said that KMC gets at least Rs26 billion annually from the Sindh’s finance department and has a total strength of some 16,000 employees. While the District Municipal Corporations (DMCs) have a total strength of 33,611 employees and receive Rs31.26 billion every year.
According to the break-up, DMC Central is led by MQM-P chairman Rehan Hashmi and gets Rs7.98 billion funds while the strength of its employees is estimated to be 10,155. DMC Korangi headed by MQM-P chairman Nayyar Raza has a budget of Rs5.306 billion and a strength of some 6,000 employees.
DMC West headed by MQM-P chairman Izhar Ahmed Khan gets Rs6.88 billion from the provincial government and has over 6,700 employees. DMC East led by MQM-P chairman Moid Anwar gets Rs2.636 billion and has 3800 employees.
Moreover, DMC Malir which has elected the PPP’s Jan Muhammad Baloch as its chairman gets Rs3.36 billion and has over 2,400 employees while DMC South led by chairman Malik Fayyaz of PPP gets Rs5.112 billion and has 4,556 employees.
Pakistan Today tried contacting Mayor Karachi Wasim Akhtar but did not get a response.