It's clear to everyone in Karachi that it has been neglected by the provincial government lead by the People's Party of Pakistan (PPP). PPP is the most corrupt entity in the country. At least other governments do 'some' development while filling their coffers. PPP undoes even the development of previous governments to fill their coffers. Karachi's institutions have been filled with political appointees with little or no merit. Everyone appointed to run the country is only interested in filling up their pockets. Even slight rains that would be unnoticeable in any other part of the country fills up sewerage lines leaking them out. This is not new. What's new is that this years rains have been unprecedentent and even upscale areas such as DHA are affected, which is why all the commotion in the media.
Why Karachi Floods
11–20 of 38 posts
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#12It's clear to everyone in Karachi that it has been neglected by the provincial government lead by the People's Party of Pakistan (PPP). PPP is the most corrupt entity in the country. At least other governments do 'some' development while filling their coffers. PPP undoes even the development of previous governments to fill their coffers. Karachi's institutions have been filled with political appointees with little or…
Since early 1980s, Karachi city is not under PPP govt. So it really doesn't matter how corrupt Pakistan Peoples Party is, Karachi has not been voting for them for nearly 40 years now. It is always MQM with some coalition who runs Karachi. Right now PPP has only 3 NA seats from Karachi.
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#13As an Indian watching these events, it refreshes my memories of flooding in Indian cities(Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore etc). Which are almost of the same scale if not more or less. I wonder if the entirety of the Indian subcontinent suffers from the same long standing issues of governance, disdain for law, corruption and in general total apathy towards one's surroundings. As a native Bangalorean. I've seen the c…
There is some variability in the state of cities across Pakistan. Karachi is the largest and most dense city by a significant margin, so its needs are much greater. In comparison, Lahore, the second largest city in the country, and the premier city of the affluent province of Punjab hosts far better infrastructure. Consequently, it suffers a mere fraction of the magnitude of such issues as Karachi. In addition to a d…
As a Westerner who travels to Pakistan once in a while, of the three biggest cities (Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad), Karachi seems like an outlier in terms of corruption, even for Pakistan, with entrenched mafia rule. I don't know the reasons this is so in Karachi, perhaps as the port city smuggling is big there.
In terms of infrastructure, Karachi also seems different as you said, with lots of apartment buildings, where other cities like Lahore is almost exclusively villas, so density will be higher with more strain on infrastructure.
A very interesting development is the premiership of Imran Khan who is politically independent (excluding being beholden to the military as is all political leaders) and genuinely making a big effort in fighting corruption. It will be interesting to see how much he can accomplish.
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#14Cantonments need to be abolished, and stricken out from the law. It's a colonial anachronism used int the past to shield British military from the local jurisdiction.
Now they just add to complete jurisdictional—topological clusterf__k.
The same is for governments of other city's subdivisions.
The lion share of Karachi's troubles is from super unclear jurisdiction over much of its function, with each player in local government throwing hot potato problems to the next one in the chain.
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is some variability in the state of cities across Pakistan. Karachi is the largest and most dense city by a significant margin, so its needs are much greater. In comparison, Lahore, the second largest city in the country, and the premier city of the affluent province of Punjab hosts far better infrastructure. Consequently, it suffers a mere fraction of the magnitude of such issues as Karachi. In addition to a d…
As a Westerner who travels to Pakistan once in a while, of the three biggest cities (Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad), Karachi seems like an outlier in terms of corruption, even for Pakistan, with entrenched mafia rule. I don't know the reasons this is so in Karachi, perhaps as the port city smuggling is big there. In terms of infrastructure, Karachi also seems different as you said, with lots of apartment buildings, wher…
We all thought he will remain politically independent. He isn't and never was. I was even part of his early campaigns as a youngster who were his main focus at the time.
He is better and many aspects very different, but political system including almost everyone surrounding him are garbage. He is facing the same challenges now for which he use to harshly criticize previous governments. I stopped watching news but the biggest is probably currency being devalued continuously.
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#16It's clear to everyone in Karachi that it has been neglected by the provincial government lead by the People's Party of Pakistan (PPP). PPP is the most corrupt entity in the country. At least other governments do 'some' development while filling their coffers. PPP undoes even the development of previous governments to fill their coffers. Karachi's institutions have been filled with political appointees with little or…
Since early 1980s, Karachi city is not under PPP govt. So it really doesn't matter how corrupt Pakistan Peoples Party is, Karachi has not been voting for them for nearly 40 years now. It is always MQM with some coalition who runs Karachi. Right now PPP has only 3 NA seats from Karachi.
MQM and the Mayor is still waiting to receive a mandate from the provincial government. All power lies with the PPP in Karachi.
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#17The problem, as with all things in Karachi, is systemic.
It results from lack of ownership which makes accountability hard (politicized institutions with diverging agendas). During these rains, an entire township (Naya Nazimabad) sank underwater and many areas are still waterlogged. This township was built on top of a low-lying lake that was reclaimed. The approval of such projects involves dozens of authorities, each of whom charges an "expediency fees" and corruption is deep rooted within them. An officer who comes in for a 2-4 year tenure on low government salaries is incentivized to maximize his earnings during his short tenure.
The second is the lack of engineering involvement. The government sector doesn't exactly attract the top talent at good salaries. The tenders on the other hand are awarded based on nepotism and personal gain. There is a long list of botched projects in the civil sector. None of the desalination and water treatments plants are operational, in the entire city, for example. They have not been for years now.
The sewerage infrastructure in many parts of the city, as exists right now, is worse than the French sewers built in the 14th century[1]. These sewers are open-top and become dumping grounds for garbage due to lack of a garbage collection infrastructure. The encroachments around and above these sewers fall victim to Tragedy of Commons[2]. The whole thing is a mess with no easy solution and if this years' heavy rainfalls become a future trend, the situation will be unsustainable. Many homes were waterlogged for days and weeks with no power or connectivity (cell towers have around 24-48 hours of standby power after which they went down).
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_sewers [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
Since early 1980s, Karachi city is not under PPP govt. So it really doesn't matter how corrupt Pakistan Peoples Party is, Karachi has not been voting for them for nearly 40 years now. It is always MQM with some coalition who runs Karachi. Right now PPP has only 3 NA seats from Karachi.
MQM and the Mayor is still waiting to receive a mandate from the provincial government. All power lies with the PPP in Karachi.
While I find the discussion of who is worse of PPP or MQM beyond meaningless, I want to state that this mean little when city's administration was effectively defunct for decades.
Up until around 2015, the de-facto Mayor slash Don of Karachi was Altaf Bhai, and Liyari gangs were his revenue department.
...
Only in the land of pure:
> Pakistan: Karachi mayor to run office from prison
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/08/pakistan-karachi-mayo...
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#19Cantonments need to be abolished, and stricken out from the law. It's a colonial anachronism used int the past to shield British military from the local jurisdiction. Now they just add to complete jurisdictional—topological clusterf__k. The same is for governments of other city's subdivisions. The lion share of Karachi's troubles is from super unclear jurisdiction over much of its function, with each player in local…
Can't the cantonment just function like its own local body working alongside the other local bodies, with proportionate allocation of budget?
I understand with the influence the defence establishment wields in the affairs, it has a greater say but isn't it in their interest to keep the financial hub of their country healthy.
Re: Why Karachi Floods
#20Cantonments need to be abolished, and stricken out from the law. It's a colonial anachronism used int the past to shield British military from the local jurisdiction. Now they just add to complete jurisdictional—topological clusterf__k. The same is for governments of other city's subdivisions. The lion share of Karachi's troubles is from super unclear jurisdiction over much of its function, with each player in local…
Can't the cantonment just function like its own local body working alongside the other local bodies, with proportionate allocation of budget? I understand with the influence the defence establishment wields in the affairs, it has a greater say but isn't it in their interest to keep the financial hub of their country healthy.
Ideally, they should be, but there are just too many administrative divisions already, and adding 6+ more to them will not do good. There is a need to dramatically simplify the "topology" of Karachi's government.
As it is now, just finding out who orders whom in Karachi is neigh impossible. One needs a special talent to think of a government system this convoluted.