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CLIFTON BEACH

• ‘Stop the sale of Karachi’s public beaches’
• Saving Karachi's beaches

• Former CJ voices doubts over beachfront privatisation

• Dirty Deals

• Waterfront project does not take poor into account

• The natural assets of Karachi have been completely usurped by the rich

• Save the Beach

• Vendors at seashore

• Handing over Clifton Beach to ‘profiteers’ slammed

• Federal govt’s project on twin islands opposed: Fisherfolk to launch movement

• Fishermen to fight against two new island cities

• Go-ahead for island city near Karachi

• Carving up the beach

• DHA plans for commercial plazas at beach opposed

• Beach Development

• Ruffled DHA seeks PRO for vexed beach project

• DHA, KPT projects along beach criticized

• Urban planners just concerned with financial benefits

• Clifton Beach: Ghariboon ka Sahil, Ameeron Ka Sahil

• Clifton Beach: Shrinking for the Poor

• The battering of our beaches

• Beach Fences

• Road closure irks people

• An unending municipal scam: CITYSCAPES

• Bagh-e-Ibn-e-Qasim project

• PM reviews progress on Jahangir Kothari parade renovation

• Lack of investment policy mars CDGK’s projects

• CDGK to launch Rs273m development projects

• Fountain for the poor, beaches for the rich

• Not alternative but to soldier on

• Citizens to legally fight DHA plans to sell beach

(20 June 2005)

The Defence Housing Authority has taken over the Clifton Beach and developed it from McDoland’s to the Salt and Pepper Restaurant. A stone embankment wall has been built on which people can sit and view the sea; a well paved service lane and parking for cars have been provided; on a one kilometre stretch steps leading to the beach have been built on which attractive seating arrangements for visitors have been developed; well designed kiosks supplying food and drinks have been placed along the promenade; and in addition, flood lights now light the entire beach. This development is indeed a valuable addition to Karachi’s recreational facilities. Thousands of people, old and young, men, women and children, visit it every week and enjoy themselves. Yet, there is a down side to this development and this piece is all about that down side.

While I was walking one day along the beautifully designed promenade I saw two persons in blue uniform manhandling a pappar wala. They had taken away his pappar bag. They were dragging him away by his hair and cursing him. On inquiry, I was told by the uniformed men that they were DHA security persons and they had orders not to permit vendors from frequenting the beach between McDoland’s and the Salt and Pepper Restaurant. “But if vendors are not permitted then what can people buy for food?” I inquired. The uniformed persons responded that they can purchase food from the kiosks provided by the DHA. Since I had purchased from the kiosks, I knew that it was far too expensive for poor families to afford. Immediately, it occurred to me that by banishing vendors from the beach the DHA had also banished the poor. I requested the Urban Resource Centre (URC) to initiate a small research on the subject and I made some further enquiries myself.

The research and enquiries reveal that the DHA has banned all chabbari walas, ketley chai walas, pappar walas, channa and mongphalli walas, bunder ka tamasha walas and jogis from the beach. The only food now available along the DHA occupied stretch is at the kiosks set up by the DHA, the Pizza Express outlet which is located in a container on the promenade, and the Walls Ice Cream mobile which is permitted to operate on the beach. The prices of food and drinks from these outlets are unaffordable to poor and lower middle income families. A comparison of these prices and what is available at the two locations is given in the attached Box. As a result, the poor no longer frequent the DHA occupied stretch of Clifton Beach. They now visit the beach accessed from the Jahangir Kothari Parade. Unlike the DHA occupied beach, there are no cars parked along this stretch. The people who visit it are visibly more badly dressed, comparatively under nourished, wearing inferior clothes and with children who often do not wear shoes. The difference is startling. However, this stretch of beach is more colourful as there are camels, horses and rehris all beautifully decorated and women too wear reds and oranges and bright blues. There are places at the exit of the beach where there are arrangements for washing your feet and shoes.

Muhammad Shoaib visits this stretch of beach every Sunday with his five children and his wife. He comes all the way from Baldia. He does not go to the DHA occupied stretch although he says that it is much more attractive and he would love to go there but if he goes there and gives in to his children’s demands, he will end up spending more than 200 Rupees. If on the other hand, he does not give in to his children’s demand, they will be unhappy and will look down on him. In addition, unlike before the place has changed and he feels uncomfortable there since people like him no longer visit that stretch of beach. He says that the DHA occupied beach is now called Ameeron ka Sahil and the stretch that he now frequents is called Gharaiboon ka Sahil.

Tasnim teaches at a government school. She is 22 years old and lives in Baloch Colony. She and her friends visit Gharaiboon ka Sahil regularly but they prefer the DHA occupied stretch. When they receive their salaries at the beginning of the month, they visit Ameeron ka Sahil and enjoy spending some of what they have earned.

Both Tasnim and Muhammad Shoaib have heard that the entire beach is going to be developed for rich people. These rumours are floating around the sea front. They are worried that they and their families will loose the only inexpensive recreational area left in the city. “Wherever you go now you have to pay. Travel costs have become high. At Allauddin Park and at Fun Land they rob you. Where should poor people take their families?” asks Muhammad Shoaib. He adds “why do they not just gather us together and throw their atom bomb on us? It would be easier for them and for us.”

Meanwhile, the pappar, chai, channa walas still try and operate on the sly on the DHA occupied beach. When they are caught by the DHA “daroghas” they are cursed, beaten and their goods taken or thrown away. Another punishment that is meted out is to put them in a car and leave them far away at a lonely spot so that they have to walk back. Many of the chabbari walas are young boys in their early teens and URC interviews of them show that they come from the very poor backgrounds and some of them have to borrow money on a daily basis to be able to purchase their sellable items. Altaf is 16 years old and sells pappar. He has been caught twice by the daroghas. I asked him as to why he does not sell at the Gharaiboon ka Sahil. He responds that there are already too many people selling there and also that he has been selling on this beach since he was 7 years old. He feels he has a claim to sell here. In addition, he says that the people selling on the other beach will not allow him to sell there since it would affect their sales adversely. He wants to know if the DHA daroghas have the right to treat the vendors as they do. “They are not the police, they are not the law, but then where can a poor man seek justice? If I go to the police, they will lock me up.”

There is also a bunder wala. He is over 55 years of age. His bunder’s (monkey’s) name is Aloo Master. He says that he has performed on this beach for more than 25 years. He cannot do that anymore. He also feels that both he and Aloo Master have a claim on this stretch of beach. “Rich people do not like poor people but they do like animals. For Aloo Master’s sake they should let us perform. I can hardly feed him now. He puts with starvation without complaining for he understands the problem. For the poor there is no sunwai.”

Karachi has lost all its multi-class recreational and entertainment places. Saddar, the old town institutional and community buildings and spaces, cinemas, have all gone. They have been the victims of massive environmental degradation, absence of social and cultural considerations in urban planning, and an elite that has chosen to ghettoize itself out of fear and ignorance and in the process it has usurped the city’s natural assets for its own benefit. Clifton Beach has been an exception to this, but not any more.

The DHA occupied beach can be given back its multi-class environment without adversely affecting the facilities and ambiance that the DHA has provided. Chabbri walas and vendors can be provided special spaces within which they can operate and areas can be reserved for bunder and snake ka tamashas. If the poor and rich cannot share public space, then we are heading for major conflicts similar to those in Johannesburg and Rio de Janeiro and the rich will be as much the victims as the poor.

Box: A comparison of Rates: Survey of Clifton and Sea View (DHA Occupied) Beach

Source: Urban Resource Centre Survey.

Bagh Ibne Qasim Ist phase completed

BY JAMIL KHAN

KARACHI - The first phase of the multimillion Bagh Ibne Qasim project had been completed and the remaining was expected to be completed in February 2006, said District Officer, Parks and Horticulture, Liaquat Ali Khan on Saturday. 

Talking to The Nation, DO Liaquat Ali said that the first phase of the project would be opened for public on November 26 and President General Pervez Musharraf was likely to inaugurate it.
He said that the project worth Rs 600 million, including construction of funland, aquarium, beach park, parking lots and others was started in July this year and would be completed at the end of February 2006. 

DO Liaquat said that the project of Bagh Ibne Qasim was one of the projects which had been in limbo for the last 30 years but the caretaker City government took a bold step to start work on the project on the instruction of Governor Sindh Dr Ishratul Ebad. 

“This will be a great achievement of the caretaker administration,” he said adding that not only the Karachiites but also the entire Pakistanis would have a big recreational park.”
“We are also planning to include other facilities like dolphin pool, mono train, skating there.”.

Before the beginning of the project, the City government had removed about 400 shops and other structures that had been constructed illegally there, he said adding that this was the only largest project which would be completed in six months, he said.

Responding to a question, he said that about 50 per cent of work on the park had been completed, and the remaining would be finished in February, as various contractors were working round-the-clock to complete it on time.

He further said that the Beach Park had been constructed on 47 acres of land at the cost of Rs 260 million. The facilities included pathways, domes of the pattern of Kothari Parade, concrete benches, marble canopies, electric floodlights, fencing, and playing ground for the children, he added. He further said that the work on the construction of pathways, jogging tracks, domes of the pattern of Kothari Parade, benches, electric lights, fencing and playing area of children was in progress and the entire area would be open for public soon. 

The development work at aquarium and funland was also underway and the these would be completed in February. 

The funland, which had existed in the middle of Bagh Ibne Qasim, had now been shifted at one of the sides of the park to provide a maximum space for children so that they had maximum amusement. 

He also mentioned that in the whole area there would be six parking spaces to park around 3,000 vehicles, saying that 50 per cent work had been completed on this project. 

The City District Government Karachi has decided to auction the food court and parking spaces on short-term lease. 

(Daily The Nation 20/11/05 )

The battering of our beaches

AS announced in the headline over a news item in this newspaper on February 7, ‘The Supreme Court puts public interest over private profit.’ The previous day, a three-member bench led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry cancelled a lease awarded by the Capital Development Authority to a Lahore businessman who had planned to develop a mini-golf club in a public park in Sector F-7, Islamabad.

The chief justice stressed that the laws of the CDA are clear: public parks, graveyards, incidental open spaces, etc., will be developed by the authority only and he advised the CDA that if it allowed people to haphazardly start commercial activities in public spaces it would “repent not adhering to its original policy.”

Now, the ocean foreshore of Karachi is the heritage of all Pakistanis, including our future generations, held as a public trust by the government of the day. It is non-sustainable; once it is gone, it is gone. The city’s population is increasing by 500,000 a year. We need all our beaches to cater for increased recreational needs.

Beaches are not a luxury. They are public spaces that provide a different set of rhythms for the renewal of public life. Beaches are democratic commons that bring people together to stroll, to paddle, swim, splash in the waves, ‘watch’ the surf, and gaze into the sunset. Public access to the beach is integral to democracy and equality.

Karachi is almost destitute of parks and playgrounds and open spaces. It has fewer acres of such spaces per 1,000 residents as compared to any major city in the developed world. There are also vast disparities in the access to parks and recreation. In middle and low-income areas citizens do not have, near enough, open spaces in their neighbourhoods — but they do have more than their fair share of toxic waste and pollutants. The middle and lower-income groups, to be able to breathe, throng to our public beaches on public holidays and weekends.

What atrocity has already been perpetrated on the Clifton beach? The city government has built two parallel parapets which hide the sea from public view. Parapets are normally hip-high as were the parapets built by Sir Jehangir Kothari in 1912, still standing for all to emulate. What our city government, obsessed with size, has built is head-high. Why? Could it be to enrich the brick makers and layers? The factotums responsible need to do something to rectify this folly. How the citizens have reacted can be gauged from the number of letters to the editors of all our newspapers that have appeared in print, all objecting strongly to the fact that the sea has been obliterated from the much vaunted park by the sea.

And further folly from our MQM Minister for Ports & Shipping, Babar Ghauri. Whilst once in Jeddah on one of the many ‘official’ visits our ministers indulge in, he spotted a water jet spouting high into the air in front of the royal palaces. In search of glory, he ordered the Karachi Port Trust to have it replicated in Karachi’s sea, without bothering about how much it would cost to purchase, instal and operate. Who has it enriched, and on which continent? Ghauri’s approach is totally in line with the ministerial norm, but what we must have difficulty in believing is that not one of the dozen or so KPT trustees, who hold the people’s money in trust, recorded a note of dissent.

It was ‘wah-wah, minister sahib’ all the way — there was not one man amongst them. This has also enraged a large number of citizens who have publicly in print expressed their disgust — one excellent thing is that now people are becoming aware of their rights and of their government’s extravaganzas and waste of public funds and are loudly and clearly voicing their discontent.

Now to the real danger. In April 2005, five concerned citizens of the Defence Housing Authority approached the Sindh High Court (CP 403/05) seeking to save a section of the beach, the 13-acre ‘Usmani Park’ (between Beach Avenue and the sea) from being converted into a gigantic shopping, entertainment and residential project. In January 2006, the NGO Shehri intervened in the petition and has placed a number of facts on record. It has been pointed out that if the DHA is allowed to get away with this ‘privatization’ of the public beach, it will not be too long before attempts are made to exploit and privatize the other few amenities, spaces and facilities that are left to us — even perhaps the very air we breathe.

The petition states that the sea-shore conversion project is in violation of the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997. Increased commercialization will cause pollution, destroy marine micro-organisms, and will result in the extinction or mass reduction of fish, turtles, and coastal birds, and also in the depletion of the sea-food industry. Additionally, a Sindh government notification of May 1975 prohibits the leasing of land within the area of the ports or sea shore limits. The beaches around the DHA are within the port limits of the Karachi Port Trust and the Port Qasim Authority.

DHA has a grand plan to convert 14 km of “virgin, unspoilt (sic) waterfront” (quoted in a DHA newsletter) into a $-600 million series of playgrounds and leisure/pleasure spots called the “DHA Waterfront Development Project” to afford the rich and affluent of Karachi “the luxuries of an aristocratic life”. This extravaganza consists of seven Zones (A to G) with expensive commercial, entertainment, residential, commercial, hotel and office buildings, and includes “reclamation of 74.5 acres of land, for high-end Hotel Complex”, “5-star hotels owning private segments of the beach” and a “private beach with lagoon for hotel & residential blocks”.

Apparently, various MOUs have been entered into with local and foreign parties to ‘privatize’ and ‘develop’ the seashore. Such extravaganzas will disenfranchise 95 per cent of the residents of Karachi from over 30 per cent of the 42-km urban beachfront of their city.

In the Zone-A, Usmani Park plot, three structures, have been planned for construction by a developer: a five-storey (900,000 sq ft) shopping mall and entertainment complex with hyper-market, cineplex, ice-skating rink, food court, retail shops, gaming arcade, and so on; a 50-storey commercial office tower, and a 50-storey hotel and apartment tower. In keeping with the norm, no thought has been given to the traffic and parking chaos that will be generated, nor of the unbearable load on the utilities — water, electricity and sewerage, etc. Additionally, the view of the sea of all houses along Beach Avenue will be blocked.

In December 2005, the DHA invited expressions of interest for development of a 48-acre recreational Zone-B (located between MacDonald’s and Kinara restaurants, in front of Seaview Apartments) which includes a 600-ft. high ‘Monumental Tower’ and an amphitheatre on reclaimed land.

Public access to the beach is protected under the public trust doctrine. Beaches enjoy a special amenity status with all the protection that the law affords to public amenity land. In recent years, the protests of citizens about the commercialization of beaches along the Clifton sea-shore and beyond have been mounting, but are totally ignored by the rapaciously greedy DHA and the concerned government authorities.

The outcome of the petition will determine whether or not only the rich and powerful have the right to the benefit of the Almighty’s bounty and will establish whether or not the wealthy and influential can usurp for their selfish private use a natural facility and resource that should by right be enjoyed by each and every citizen without distinction.

(Daily Dawn February 19, 2006)

Beach fences

FOR a long time Clifton beach has been the most popular recreation spot for Karachiites and those coming from upcountry. This beach, in continuation with Bagh Ibne Qasim, has been lying undeveloped for decades. It is the only sizeable Karachi beach left over by the land mafia. (It is learnt that Bagh Ibn-i-Qasim was 150 acres and is now down to only 80 acres.)

Recently I was taken aback to notice that one won’t be able to have a view of the sea any more while driving on the double road running parallel to the bank of the sea as two parallel fencing walls have been raised in between. The town planners (KDA) of the good old days had very wisely taken a policy decision that no such structures would be allowed in the area between “Hawa Bandar” (helipad area) and the sea that may impede a clear view of the sea. The city government is now defying its own rules.

The strip of land alongside the coast at Clifton was reserved by KDA planners as elbow room for free and easy movement of crowds and for provision of sitting, relaxing and camping facilities. By constructing walls around these belts, the very purpose of this space has been defeated and thereby adversely affected the beauty and utility of the beach.

As regards Bagh Ibne Qasim, a fence of the same design is being constructed around it also. Here the purpose of having a boundary wall is different. It should provide security and check trespass. The design and height do not cater for either of these requirements. Proper maintenance of the park, therefore, will be difficult.

UMER FAROOQUE KHAN Karachi Daily Dawn November 13, 2005

KARACHI: Thousands of citizens, who came at the Clifton beach during Eid days, faced number of hardships due to the closure of various roads, leading to the venue.

Likewise every year, a large number of people came to Clifton from every area of the city for spending their holiday. However, this year they faced immense problems while reaching the area, as they found a number of roads closed. Many of the visitors, including children and women, left their vehicles to reach their destination on foot.

Officials, however, described the closure of roads as a precautionary measure for stopping people to visit Bagh Ibn-e-Qasim and Beach Park, which were under construction. They claimed that in order to avoid any inconvenience to the people, they had made prior announcement regarding closure of some roads. They maintained that many roads leading to Sea View were opened for vehicular traffic.

People said that the closure of roads should be publicised properly and the authorities concerned must devise an alternate routes.

(Daily The News 7/11/05)

An unending municipal scam: CITYSCAPES

By Fahim Zaman Khan

HOW does one report an unending municipal scam without annoying the beneficiaries or the self-serving rulers? The ongoing saga in Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim, located below Jehangir Kothari Parade, concerning more than 80 acres of prime Clifton land at Scheme V is one more tale of wholesale fraud, con and swindle of our successive rulers and mandarins of civic agencies. This sad spectacle of pillage and corruption continues unabated even today.

The record of land allotments pertaining to Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim at the defunct KMC or the KDA may be as elusive as grass in that park. The little record in the form of duplicate files available with the estate department may be useful to the extent of renewal of lease, yet nothing contained within them may corroborate what exists on the ground. Nor does anything on the existing statues allow disposal of this precious asset as being currently hatched.

At least on paper the defunct KMC’s original share in the development of Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim was limited to about four acres of ‘Terraced gardens, Aquarium and an Aquatic Park.’ No doubt, an aquarium and terraced gardens were developed by the KMC, however the rooftop was quickly allotted to ‘the Kishtiwallas,’ well known for their Jamaat connection, and so were 3,000 square yards of land out of the space earmarked for an aquatic park. With further allotments of 6,000 square yards, during PB Gillani’s administration and by the KMC councils during the mid-1980s, the fate of the aquatic park was sealed forever. Many old-timers bet their life that the original KMC files missing from the record could be recovered from under lock and key of the promoters/beneficiaries of the Funland that now probably spreads over 20 acres of land that no employee of the City District Government Karachi is willing to measure or document.

The KDA or its masters could not afford to risk their reputation by staying behind the KMC. Several plots of land with a commercial value of more than hundred thousand rupees per square yard were allotted in violation of universally-accepted laws and norms governing sanctity of public parks and playgrounds. For example, ST-1/A was created out of 7,972 square yards of parkland and allotted at the rate of Rs17.50 per square yard for a swimming pool, 25,000 square yards as ST-14 and 20,000 square yards as ST-16 were allotted at the rate of Rs40 per square yard. 4,005 square yards of parkland were allotted as ST-16/A and 18,000 sq yards as ST-16/B during 1992 at the rate of Rs250 per square yard for a museum of modern arts and a school; and 3,000 square yards were allotted as ST-17 for an acupuncture clinic at the rate of Rs30 per square yard.

Many buildings and structures, including a private school and a restaurant, allotted in Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim, remain functional today. The construction of Costa Livina, a highrise project being built on land originally allotted for a revolving restaurant, remains suspended due to litigation. The KDA also cancelled the allotment of 350 shops during 1996, but the six residential plots allotted to federal secretaries and high officials at the KDA nursery located within the boundaries of Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim survived cancellation probably due to kinship.

During 1994, a cash-strapped KDA transferred Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim, along with the rest of the amenities of Kehkashan Scheme V, to the KMC for maintenance purposes. The then KMC administration moved a summary to the chief minister requesting him to direct the KDA to cancel all illegal allotments made on the parkland.

Syed Abdullah Shah, then chief minister, wrote on the summary “I agree with administrator KMC, parkland must be reverted back to the city.” Subsequently, the KDA issued cancellation orders citing violation of clause Nos 6, 8 and 12 of the terms and conditions of the above allotments. The land thus acquired was also transferred to the KMC. However, the aggrieved parties immediately moved the Sindh High Court where luckily Chief Justice Wajihuddin Ahmed decided to hear those petitions himself. The KMC also moved the office of the Deputy Commissioner South to initiate acquisition proceedings for it. The matter remains pending at the Sindh High Court, while the defunct KMC and its successor has been trying to green the remaining acreage.

Last year the KDA recovered from the KMC Bagh-i-Ibn Qasim along with other parks and playgrounds in many affluent areas. The KMC had auctioned the University Road Sunday Bazaar opposite Safari Park during the year 2000 for Rs3 million. Once its control was reverted to the KDA last year this Bazaar was allowed without auction for a mere Rs600,000 and this year for Rs one million.

On 6th June 2002 our Nazim-i-Aala Naimatullah Khan signed an MoU with Sarfaraz H. Rizvi of City Trading and Contracting Company registered in Qatar for the development of a park.

What Mr. Khan and Executive District Officer Brigadier Zaheer Qadri, formerly DG KDA, do not seem to realize that as soon as this agreement is signed the parties aggrieved by the previous cancellation orders shall have a cause to move the Sindh High Court demanding restoration of their so-called cancelled properties killing the plan for a water-cum-amusement park.

After eating up huge spaces between the illegally-allotted plots the ever- enlarging Funland has now opened a gate on the park’s side. The unfolding saga of a water-cum-amusement park could well be a ploy to deprive the people of the city of a precious parkland. It may be a conspiracy by the aggrieved parties who have lost billions and billions of rupees worth of ill-gotten park property that was collectively ours. 

(Daily Dawn 27 September 2002)

KARACHI: Plans to develop the massive US$200 million Karachi Beach Theme Park Resort in Clifton have moved one stage forward with an announcement by the UK developers, Deighton International (DI), that they have now secured the necessary investment. The Chairman, Philip D. Deighton, of DI said, "Since the City District Government Karachi has awarded us the scheme, our efforts are on to sourcing the substantial funds necessary to enable this unique park to go ahead with." He went on to say, "It was now much more important for his company and the CDGK to collaborate closely to make sure this important venture becomes a success for the benefit of the people of Karachi. "Bagh-Ibn-e-Qasim is a world class site and we intend to deliver a world-class attraction," said Deighton.

(The News 24/11/05)

KARACHI: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz reviewed on Saturday the work being carried out to renovate and develop the Jahangir Kothari Parade and Bagh Ibn-e-Qasim under a mega-recreational project along the Clifton Beach.

According to a press release issued here, the Prime Minister, who visited the site, termed the work a good step for the progress of the metropolis. He appreciated the work, which according to him, would play an important role in the preservation of the city’s beauty.

Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ebad Khan briefed the PM over the beach development project. He himself took a round of various portions of the Jahangir Kothari Parade.

He said that with the passage of time, the recreational and historical places of the city were dwindling. As such, he said he was all the more pleased to see this project. He said that there was a time people from across the country used to visit the Clifton beach and if development continued the way it is, the project would become the best recreational place not only for people of Karachi but of Pakistan.

He said that the Gwadar and other such projects showed that the government was taking all-out steps for the development and prosperity of the country.

INQUIRY: Regarding the incident in which many people were severely affected after consuming contaminated water in the Landhi area, the Prime Minister said that an inquiry was under way and he himself talked to the provincial government authorities in this regard.

(Daily The News 18 septeber 2005)

KARACHI: Billions of rupees worth investment projects hit snags due to lack of any investment policy in City District Government Karachi (CDGK).

CDGK, which launched several mega investment projects since its inception in 2001, has remained unable to formulate investment policy owing to lack of commitment on part of authorities concerned. These mega projects include Bagh-e-Ibn Qasim, Development of Beaches, Water Treatment Plant, Waste to Energy, Development of Parks, Food Street, Revival of Cottage Industrial Zones and some others.

However, very little progress has been made on these projects so far and there seems no effective strategy to expedite the pace of work on these projects.

According to details, Bagh Ibn-e-Qasim project estimated cost stands at $300 million, Waste to Energy around $200 million, Development of Beaches $800 million, Development of Parks $50 million, some other projects $200 million etc.

Sources told PPI on Monday that there are no prescribed rules and regulations for investment in CDGK, which often keep away the investors to invest in CDGK’s projects. Besides ‘One-Window’ operation necessary for facilitation of investors has to be introduced by CDGK as yet.

"A number of investors took keen interest in these projects and were ready to invest in them. However, they ran away owing to non-cooperating attitude and lack of commitment on part of CDGK’s authorities.

Another factor obstructs flow of investment is absence of any streamlining in CDGK’s departments. "Enterprise and Investment Department (E&IP), specially established to deal with investment projects under SLGO, takes any decision, but the other day, some other department comes up with the queries, that make the investors to remain away from the project," sources said.

At the time of launching of development of parks project, for instance, Parks & Horticulture Department was asked to provide a list of sites for parks. "Department provided 45 sites for the purpose, but when initial modalities were being finalised, they informed that 40 of total 45 sites are in litigation, subsequently jeopardising the whole project," they added.

Acquisition of land for projects has to pass through very lengthy and cumbersome process, facing departmental and legal obstacles.

Despite the repeated reminders of department concerned to take action in this connection, authorities have yet to come up with a concrete and long-term strategy," sources added.

(Daily The News 25 August 2004)

KARACHI: The city government is going to launch new development works worth Rs273.8 million. The approval was given during a meeting of the city government District Development Working Party, presided over by District Coordination Officer (DCO) Fazlur Rahman, at Civic Centre on Monday.

Officers concerned gave briefing to the meeting participants on new development projects, including improvement of water and sewage lines, re-carpeting of roads, beautification works under all flyovers, tree plantation in parks and main roads, etc.

It was also decided that coastal strip in front of Bagh Ibn-e-Qasim, Clifton, falling in the city government limits, would be developed to facilitate picnickers. The meeting also decided that trees would be planted in abundance in Bagh Ibn-e-Qasim.

The DCO, on the occasion, asked the parks department to submit a plan in connection with the development of coastal strip. He also asked the officers concerned to ensure the removal of all hurdles in the way of the proposed projects, so that the work could be initiated at the earliest.

Rahman said that the city government would ensure in-time completion of all the projects and would never compromise on the quality and standard of work. He asked the Executive District Officer, Works and Services, Shoaib Ahmed Siddiqui, to keep paying visits to the site of the projects to keep an eye on the pace and quality of work.

The EDO (Finance), Shakil Naqvi, representatives of City Nazim Engineer Saleem Azhar and Abid Ilyas, projects directors and other officers concerned also attended the meeting.

(Daily The News 7/12/04)

Fountain for the poor, beaches for the rich

Khusro Mumtaz

The federal minister for ports and shipping, Babar Khan Ghouri, like all his fellow ministers and ministers of state and the illustrious citizens of this country with the status of minister (the combined number of which is so astronomical you need a high speed computer to keep their tally and their endless perks and privileges straight), really feels for the poor and underprivileged. He feels for them so much that he’s gone and built them a 650-foot high fountain (the second highest in the world) in Karachi so that they don’t have to bear the onerous cost of travelling to Switzerland for some rest and recreation. The mystery of why Pakistan’s commercial capital had to be presented with this supreme gift has finally been solved. And I’m not making any of this up. Mr Ghouri made his declaration on the floor of the National Assembly itself.

Let’s get this straight then. People in Karachi don’t have safe drinking water and the city’s sanitation, sewage and drainage system is in the worst shape possible (witness the havoc wreaked by the recent rains) and millions of its residents are slum dwellers yet Mr. Ghouri thinks it’s a good idea to spend Rs320 million not on fixing these problems or on funding schools and health clinics for the poor but on a fountain. A fountain that when it does work (by design — reportedly — it remains inoperative for half the year) sends water shooting uselessly up into the sky so that poor people — repeat, “poor people” — can gawk at it while holding on to their starving and parched children. Brings to mind Coleridge’s lines: “Water, water everywhere / Nor a drop to drink”.

Even if we accept that this is just what the poverty-stricken multitude of Karachi has been asking for and hence is forever in the sympathetic minister’s debt somebody still needs to tell Mr Ghouri of the Defence Housing Authority’s latest scheme. The DHA has plans which are well underway for a waterfront project that, once completed, may not even let his “poor people” of the city anywhere near the fountain or the Clifton beach area. According to the DHA’s own press release of February 2005, it has initiated a US$623 million commercial (emphasis mine) project that will cover the 14-kilometre long stretch of beach from the site of the abandoned old casino up to the Golf Club.

The project envisages a “shopping mall with best entertainment facilities, a food court, a hype-market, in-line retail, covered/open car parking, gaming facilities, ground-plus six storey buildings, commercial office towers, go-kart track facilities and service apartments”. It also includes an exclusive (emphasis mine) high-rise residential complex over 10.3 acres with 50-storey towers. 74 acres of land would be reclaimed (emphasis mine) for these 50-storey residential/office monoliths, town houses, a five-star hotel (but, of course) and a “most modern amphitheatre” and “most modern and the state-of-art (sic) entertainment centre”. American and Dubai-based companies are involved in the whole enterprise.

What all this 5-star exclusivity — an offering to the gods of globalisation and commercialisation — translates to is the exclusion of poor people from a public area the use of which they are entitled to by law. Once completed, most of the project’s facilities will be free only to those who can afford to pay for it. Those who can’t (meaning Mr Ghouri’s favoured underprivileged souls), be damned. In fact, the poor are already being made to feel unwelcome. The small-time hawkers, street vendors and rehri-wallahs have been turned into persona non grata and are being deprived of their livelihoods so that multinational food chains can take their place.

Our compassionate minister Ghouri needs to be told that the poor people that he’s so concerned about don’t dream of travelling to Switzerland to look at some water fountain. What they dream about is having electricity, clean water, jobs, education, and food on the table for their families. For rest and recreation they would be happy enough to go to the beach or to a nearby public park. Lord knows Karachi needs many more public parks and green areas for its 15 million residents, particularly the underprivileged ones. How about building more public parks with public funds, Mr. Ghouri? How about ensuring continued free access to public beaches — one of the very few options available for some cheap, wholesome entertainment for the less fortunate — for those who can’t afford to be gouged for the privilege?

There are also bigger issues to be considered here. Firstly, and most importantly, it needs to be determined whether the DHA has any authority over the Clifton beach. Beaches are legally meant for the public at large. Can the DHA undertake a project which excludes a majority of the city’s population? This also raises the issue of the legality and the process of allocation of public land to the armed forces. But we’ll leave this very important discussion for a future date.

In the meantime, the DHA needs to inform the public whether it has carried out an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) prior to the commencement of the project. This is a requirement of the law (under the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act, 1997) for projects of such magnitude. Moreover, the findings of the EIA have to be put before the general public and their opinions and concurrence sought before the project can proceed. This means that it is our right as citizens of this city and this country to participate in such a decision-making process. It is not just our right but our obligation. We owe it to ourselves and to those who come after us. The privileged among us owe it to the poverty-stricken, the disadvantaged, the deprived. There are those among us who are guided not by their conscience but by the lure of shekels — we can no longer afford to sit back and let them determine our fates. The writer is a banker and freelance writer. Email: khusro_m@yahoo.co.uk

(Daily The News   Monday, August 28, 2006)

JUST before 0700 hours on August 24 the telephone rang. On the line was my good friend, Dr Shershah Suri, urging me to act quickly, at once. Why? I asked. Well, the party workers of the MQM are busy hacking off, discriminately, the branches of the 100-year old trees that line Bunder Road.

That day, the party was to organize a mass rally on Bunder Road to protest against the MMA opposition to the passing of the amendment to the Hadood Ordinances and it was planned that the party chief, self-exiled Altaf Hussain Bhai would address the gathered faithful from the safety and comfort of his north London suburban headquarters. The trees would obstruct the sound of his voice — they had to be dealt with.

Who, I asked Shershah, is available at this time of the morning and who, if available, will do anything to save the trees? The rally was held, the entire city’s traffic was disrupted, the trees suffered, and Altaf Bhai’s expected harangue, the voice of the famed Londoner, was not heard. Science let us down.

The next day, the 25th, an invitation card arrived from the Pakistan Association for Mental Health for a fund-raising gala evening. It bore cheerful tidings which set the trend for that day:

“Every other house in Karachi has one or more persons taking tranquillisers.

“Every fifth house has a psychosomatic/psychiatric problem disturbing family members, the neighbourhood of society in general.

“Every tenth house has a psychiatric patient needing medical attention for depression, psychosis, psychosomatic disorders, obsession, mental retardation, epilepsy, and drug dependence.

“In Pakistan there are 16 million people who are mentally disturbed.

“In Karachi there are 16 hundred thousand people suffering from emotional, intellectual and/or social adjustment disorders.

“Among them, at least three hundred thousand are those who need psychiatric/psychological attention. They are likely to become a permanent burden on society if not taken care of.”

On the morning of the 26th, Roland deSouza, chairperson of Shehri, appeared with more good news to lighten up the day. This time it was about the beaches of Karachi, or what remains of them. In April last year, five concerned citizens of the Defence Housing Authority approached the Sindh High Court (CP 403/05) seeking to save one section of the beach — the 13-acre Usmani Park, between Beach Avenue and the sea — from being converted into yet another blight on our lives, another gigantic shopping-cum-entertainment-cum-residential complex. Last January, Shehri too intervened with a petition of its own. It was brought to the court’s attention that if the DHA is allowed to get away with this ‘privatization’ of the public beach, it will have the adverse effect of encouraging other parties to attempt to exploit and privatise what other few open spaces, amenities and facilities are left for the people. Going overboard slightly, Roland even suggested that the polluted air we breathe may even be in danger.

As the petition states, the sea shore conversion project is in violation of the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997. If this ‘development’ is allowed, the increased commercialisation will add to the existing pollution. It will destroy any surviving marine micro-organisms and will result in the extinction or mass reduction of fish, turtles, and coastal birds, and in the general depletion of the sea-food industry.

A Sindh government notification of May 1975 prohibits the leasing of land within the area of the ports or sea shore limits. The beaches around the DHA are within the limits of the Karachi Port Trust and the Port Qasim Authority.

According to a DHA newsletter, the Authority has a grand plan to convert 14 kilometres of “virgin, unspoilt (sic) waterfront” into a $600 million series of playgrounds and leisure/pleasure spots to be known as the ‘DHA Waterfront Development Project’ which will provide to the rich and affluent of Karachi “the luxuries of an aristocratic life”. This extravaganza consists of seven zones with expensive commercial, entertainment, residential, commercial, hotel and office buildings, and includes the “reclamation of 74.5 acres of land, for a high-end Hotel Complex,” and “5-star hotels owning private segments of the beach,” and a “private beach with lagoon for hotel & residential blocks.”

The citizens must have a very convincing case because the DHA has finally retained the professional services of two legal heavyweights — Makhdoom Ali Khan, the Attorney-General of Pakistan, and Anwar Mansoor Khan, the Advocate-General of Sindh, both acting in their private capacities — to prove the citizens wrong.

After what we have suffered over the past month — and are still suffering the after-effects, can this city really cope with these gimmicky development schemes which only serve to line a few select pockets? Is there any infrastructure to bear further so-called ‘development’ projects? This city has 16 to 18 million inhabitants, nearly half of whom live in katchi abadis. It has serious problems with its water supply, sewerage systems, storm drainage, and electricity supply.

With the completion of the K-III water scheme, the Indus river supply exceeds 550 million gallons per day (MGD = 1,000,000 GD) with a further 100MGD coming from the Hub dam. With 650MGD, Karachi’s inhabitants have 35-40 gallons available per head per day, a figure that is adequate in our context. Yet water is not getting to all the people. The Karachi Water and Sewerage Board’s contention that there is a 30 per cent (180MGD) leakage seems exaggerated. The main reasons are theft, in equitable distribution, and the absence of the writ of the government — anarchy and no Law and Order, which is the responsibility of a government.

Of the 450MGD untreated sewage that flows into the gutters, approximately 100MGD is treated in three poorly operating sewage-treatment plants. So, 350MGD of untreated effluent flows into the Arabian Sea and into the creeks around Karachi. This amount would fill some 40 super-tanker ships of 50,000-tonne capacity each on a daily basis. Do we qualify even as a second world country?

The surface drainage of this city died with the recent rains — about three inches only. Unplanned urbanisation, ad hoc construction, the closure of natural nallahs and drains with illegal buildings will make this a recurring problem. The administration has combined the sewerage and storm drainage systems, but takes no steps to clean the drains before the monsoons.

The recently privatized KESC has inherited an overloaded and dilapidated generation, transmission and distribution network, with a demand load of about 2000MW, from which about 20 per cent of the available electricity is stolen. The system collapsed at its weakest points during the downpour, leaving many residential, commercial and industrial areas without power for days on end. Many persons were electrocuted by fallen wires during the rain.

A well thought-out proactive, not reactive, methodology is required to address the issues of the critical utilities in this city — not the expropriation of whatever spaces are left open and massive commercialisation and ‘development’ relying on the present totally inadequate infrastructure. Whoever it be who has this city at his mercy needs to get his priorities lined up in the right direction.

Who was it who exhorted us to ‘never despair’? E-mail: arfc@cyber.net.pk

(Daily Dawn  August 27, 2006)

KARACHI: Non-government organizations (NGOs), trade unions and political parties have joined hands to fight the privatization of Karachi's beaches with a legal, signature and media campaign.

These groups met Wednesday for a discussion forum on 'Clifton Beach and Sea View: Proposed plans and their impact' at the Urban Resource Centre (URC) head office with senior urban planner and URC chairman Arif Hasan in chair. The main concern was the multi-billion dollar projects that will stretch over 14 kilometres of Clifton beach for commercial and residential construction that could effectively shut off these areas for the general public.

The URC, Aurat Foundation, Orangi Pilot Project, Church World Services, Edhi Welfare Foundation, Pakistan People Party, People Labour Bureau KESC were some of the organizations that have backed this cause in addition to lawyers, professors, doctors and students of Karachi and NED universities.

A 15-member action committee was formed to conduct the campaign and will meet next week to implement decisions made at the meeting.

Arif Hasan talked about the negative impact of the $1.5 billion Water Front Development Project, which was announced by the Defence Housing Authority (DHA).

After it is ready, the public will not have access to the beaches of the city, he said. In the past, DHA developed the Sea View Housing Project, which has given rise to water pollution as untreated domestic waste is discharged into the sea, he added.

"It is an international law that any construction and development between roads and beaches is not allowed.

The governments of India, Bangkok, Sri Lanka have banned any development and construction along beach sites. But in Pakistan these laws have been changed by the mafia," said Hasan.

Participants were concerned over the allotment of the beach in the name of development and said that DHA had no right to take over recreational facilities.

"All recreational spots are being grabbed by the land mafia in connivance with the authorities," said Tahira Hussain, a lawyer. "According to the Sindh Building Control Ordinance, beaches reserved for recreational proposes are not mean to be sold for housing schemes."

She suggested that society and political organizations should study every aspect of the laws and fill a petition against the project. "We should use a legal war and approach the courts," she urged.

Trade union activist Latif Mughal said that the present government did not have a clear policy for the general public. He proposed an awareness campaign to mobilize public opinion against the privatization of the beaches.

He said that the government authorities had their owns laws for the sale of public resources to private parties for commercial purposes. But the public should come forward to oppose this, he added.

The Pakistan Peoples Party declared its support for the campaign against DHA, which is selling beaches to the private parties. "The PPP will also approach other political parties to raise this issue," said former senator Taj Haider of the PPP. "The DHA's decision to turn this vital ecological and recreational asset into private property for nascent commercial exploitation needs to be carefully reviewed," he added as the city already faces a shortage of recreational facilities.

"Beaches cannot be allotted to private parties," he added.

(Daily Times, Thursday, August 17, 2006)

 
KARACHI, Sept 2: Speakers at a workshop criticised the civic agencies for carrying out beach development projects, which they feared would deny access to the poor masses to the seashore.

These views were expressed at a consultative workshop on “Karachi city: searching for sustainable urban development paradigm” organised by Shehri in collaboration with the Friedrich Naumann Foundation here on Saturday.

The speakers said that people should try to assert their ownership over the city resources and various organisations managing these, as with better monitoring the quality of life of the Karachiites would hopefully improve.

Speaking on the occasion, Arif Hasan, an expert in town planning, said that the ecological concerns had been ignored by KPT while constructing its installation as it did not leave any channel for the flow of water from three main stormwater drains into the sea. This, he said, was a major cause for the disastrous situation experienced by citizens during the recent rains in the city.

He pointed out that the DHA had acquired a 14-km-long strip of land along the beach in the name of ‘development’, adding: “If this process continues, then less citizens will have access to beaches as construction would be carried out all along the beach.”

He deplored the authorities for evaluating plans for the elite only, instead of the majority, which belonged to middle and lower classes and formed more than 70 per cent of the population.

He noted that a large number of Karachiites lived in katchi abadis or slums, and argued that even in the Far East, governments would chalk out plans for housing, development, recreation, etc., for the under-privileged class which lacked basic amenities of life.

He said that in this city, millions of tons of effluent were being flushed and dumped into the sea, adding to the miseries of fishermen communities living in the areas along Korangi Creek for centuries.

Other speakers said that actions such as cellphone or purse snatching provoked resistance but illegal allotment of amenity plots in the city went unnoticed. It was due to fact that in the case of purse etc, there was a sense of proprietorship, while in case of amenity plots one did not feel that they belonged to the residents of the city, so nobody raised any hue and cry and the plunder continued, it was pointed out.

They said that a new coastal development plan was being finalised owing to which almost 80 per cent of the beach, which was a national resource and nobody could restrict anybody’s entry to it, would become private and out of bounds for the common people.

One of the speakers said that some time back the DHA while developing the beach at Seaview Township removed the vendors and others selling low cost edibles, snake charmers, jugglers, and others and the low income group people stopped going there as majority of the families visiting that beach could not afford to buy the expensive food items being sold at the stalls, and that beach became out of the reach of the poor.

Similarly now a huge park is being developed at the Clifton beach by the city government and under a similar exercise people selling low cost food items, etc are being shifted, and after some time this beach will also be out of the reach of the masses.

He said that there were over 150 stalls selling goods made from sea shells for over a century, but now they had been evicted and these people were now selling their goods to shops set up in nearby buildings and their earnings had also declined. All this is going on, but nobody is coming up and raising the issue to protect the right to access the beaches of the poor people, he added.

Another speaker said that many nullahs that used to drain rainwater from the city had been encroached upon and some of these had even been allotted decreasing their capacity to drain the rainwater and during the recent rains, which were just three inches, many portions of the city remained inundated for many days even after the rains had stopped.

They said that owing to the greed of the people managing the city and national resources vast patches of land had been reclaimed from the China Creek, the back waters for the Karachi harbour, thus increasing the dredging cost of the harbour channel. The DHA had also reclaimed land which had affected the sea current.

One of the speakers said that the tendency to speculate in-land and housing among the middle class people had taken roots owing to which, whenever a new housing scheme was announced it was booked, but as a large number of the people getting these plots or flats were speculators so on one hand many plots and flats remained vacant, and on the other a large number of people who wanted these could not afford to purchase such properties. This is due to the speculation which inflates the prices out of the reach of the poor masses, he added.

The speakers said that the recent rains brought to the fore the follies and extreme shortcomings of the urban planning and development in the city and the people suffered the consequences of overflowing sewers, flooded streets and neighbourhoods, power outages and collapse of communication systems, and most of the civic agencies, government or private, were engaged in a heated blame game, accusing each other for being responsible for the unfolding crisis.

They said that as the Northern Bypass was being constructed, so there was no need left for Lyari Expressway, but it was being constructed and over 200,000 people had been uprooted from their ancestral homes in which their families had been living for over 200 years.They said that respiratory tract and eye diseases were increasing owing to the air pollution in the city due to the vehicular smoke while the lead in the fuel was causing retardation among people – women, children and elderly being more vulnerable.

They said over 300 million gallons of raw sewage, including untreated industrial effluents, was entering the sea daily seriously affecting the aquatic life and fragile marine ecosystem. They said that at least two new power plants were coming up in the city without carrying out the mandatory exercise of environmental impact assessment. The speakers were of the view that unless the citizens realised that these were their resources and that the organisations managing these resources were not properly handling these resources and if they did not forge unity to resist against this plunder it would continue to go on. They said that it was time to join hands and raise their voice so that these resources were used wisely and the coming generations could also benefit from these.

They said that earlier, the information regarding these projects etc was not made available by the government departments, but now with the recently announced access to information law hopefully the government organisations would provide information, which was necessary to understand and become aware of the effects of any project or new activity.

Arif Hassan, Tasneem Siddiqui, Roland D’Souza, Dr Noman Ahmad, Amber Alibhai, Farhan Anwer, Hamid Maker, and others also spoke.

(By Bhagwandas, Daily Dawn Karachi, September 03, 2006)

KARACHI: Planning is being done by those who only are interested in financial benefits; and when it comes to responsibility, none of the civic authorities and agencies seem assured of their jurisdictions.

This was highlighted by Roland D’Souza, Electrical Engineer and Chairperson, Shehri-CBE, at a consultative workshop on “Karachi City: Searching for a Sustainable Urban Development Paradigm,” organised by Shehri here on Saturday. The workshop was aimed at discussing among the relevant stakeholders, the related issues and concerns and seek solutions through a coordinated problem- solving approach.

“Authorities must not rush into projects without involving other civic agencies as well as the general public”, said Amber Alibhai, General Secretary, Shehri-CBE. Regardless of the area (it may be Nazimabad, Cantonment or Port Qasim) any development that occurs within the city leaves its effects on the other areas of the city, commented Amber. Preservation and conservation of Karachi’s Natural and Built Environment is necessary as numerous International as well as national visitors come to see the metropolis.

We need to follow many worldwide examples where the private sector has developed the cities with the help of their governments, she said. Four separate case studies dealing with important urban development plans and projects were presented by noted urban planning and development experts in an effort to identify the relevant contributing policy and planning dimensions of the urban development crisis in the city.

“A development project needs to be planned in such a way that the majority would get benefits from that, and not only a particular group; whereas we have always neglected the big part of our population (Katchi Abadis that is about 70 percent) while planning development projects,” said Arif Hasan, noted urban planner and Chairman, Urban Resource Centre (URC) who presented a case study on the DHA Waterfront Development Project. Development, whether it has already been done or is being planned along the coastline has no room for the lower classes, most of whom had earned their livelihood from the same place. Previously, the poor hawkers were forced by DHA to leave main Sea View. All the monkey men, tea sellers and other hawkers then moved over to the other side which started being called as Gharibon Ka Saahil. Later, the City Government evicted them from there also for the Beach Park had to be developed. Although it has been said by the City Government throughout that this development has been done for the poor classes, not a single family belonging to that class can afford the expensive entertainment they are being forced to enjoy, Arif said. Be it the DHA, KPT or the City Government, no one has planned development projects keeping Karachi’s majority population in mind. “Eighty-two percent area of the open sea is now inaccessible to the common man due to all the development that has been carried out in between the sea and the road,” disclosed Hasan.

(The News, September 03, 2006)

KARACHI: In a bid to alleviate organized public pressure against the increasingly controversial multi-billion dollar Waterfront project, the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) has decided to appoint a public representative, Daily Times has learnt.

NGOs and professional bodies have protested against the DHA’s plans to build the Waterfront Development Project comprising a commercial complex, monumental tower, amusement park, five-star hotel, amphitheatre complex and water sports facilities, along 14 kilometers of Clifton beach starting from Old Casino to Golf Course. They argue that this project will effectively block off access to prime recreational beach land for the public. They contend that it is against international laws for any construction along this type of land which the public have a right to freely access.

According to sources, the DHA administration has asked the Defence Association Coordination Committee (DACC), a Defence-based CBO, to gave the names of two representatives who could make suggestions on the issue of the public’s access along Clifton beach after the construction of the Waterfront Development Project. For example, according to page 4 of the DHA master plan for the project, “the private dwellings of the residents extend up to the beach, which therefore is their private space”. The residential complex is spread over 10 acres of land.

“A DACC delegation met the DHA administrator who asked us to submit the names of public representatives, who can represent the problems and grievances of the public,” said Aziz Suharwardy, general secretary, DACC, while talking to Daily Times.

He said that these public representatives would help defuse the tension between the NGOs and DHA over the $1.5 billion project. DACC has submitted the names of the public representatives, he added.

According to DHA officials, the DHA Governing Body also discussed the issue of access for the general public and reiterated its “confidence” in the efficacy of the project, which envisages the provision of free and uninhibited accessibility to 80 percent of prime beachfront area to the general public in its “improved yet pristine form”. The project would turn Clifton beach into an attractive recreational and entertainment resort free of any charge, officials claimed.

A DHA spokesman categorically refuted the allegation that the Waterfront Development Project would deny beach access to the common citizen. He said that not even one kilometer of land would be denied to the general public.

The spokesman stressed that the master plan envisaged state-of-the-art entertainment facilities for the beach to cater to the requirements of the “recreation-starved middle and lower classes”.

The NGOs and professional bodies recently started a campaign against the project and they include, Shehri, the Urban Resource Centre and professors at NED University. They decided to approach the president and prime minister.

“We are planning to appeal to the higher authorities to preserve and protect our parks, amenity plots and beaches from being commercialized and turned into shopping malls, high rises etc.,” said Muhammad Younis, director, Urban Resources Centre (URC).

Younis said that the Clifton remained a free publicly-owned area for the enjoyment and benefit of the less affluent. It was of great concern, and frightening as well, that over the years all multi-class recreational, entertainment and cultural space, which existed previously, has disappeared in the city, he added.

Younis gave the example of Saddar that has become a transit camp for commuters, the old city has been turned into a warehouse and, as a result, its community institutions and beautiful buildings have been abandoned; numerous populist auditoriums and libraries have disappeared; museums, zoos and inner city parks are no longer frequented by the elite; and cinemas which provided affordable entertainment to lower-income families have been forced to close down.

“Poor settlements are being bulldozed (often illegally) and their inhabitants are being pushed to the periphery of the city far away from health, education and recreational facilities. The rich have ghettoized themselves and stolen the natural assets of the city for their exclusive use,” said Younis.

The director of the URC also expressed concern over the allotment of the beach in the name of its “development”.

According to him, in the past, DHA had established a number of clubs along Gizri beach, which benefit the influential and rich and have cut off access for other people of Karachi. According to the Sindh Building Control Ordinance, beaches are reserved for recreational proposes not for housing schemes, he said.

While much of the country has seen local government in the form of a system of elected representatives -- led by nazims and naib nazims and so on -- some anomalies continue to exist in the form of the cantonment boards and defence housing authorities which are autonomous and whose administrators are answerable only to the military high command. In the past this would not have been much of a problem because most of the cantonments were inhabited by troops and actually served as garrisons. However, over time and with the phenomenal rise in the price of a plot of land and its consequential effect on all and sundry, this changed so much so that cantonments, especially in the larger cities, are now inhabited mostly by civilians. Hence, it would make sense that the same kind of governing arrangement, following the introduction of local government in civilian districts of the country, should be extended to the cantonment boards as well. This isn't the first time that such a demand is being made -- in the past, the government had said that it would in due course of time attend to this matter and a decision would be taken.

The time has now come to make that decision because the unelected and non-representative officials that run these boards and defence housing authorities tend to take decisions that affect all residents (most of whom are civilians and have paid for the land at its full market value as opposed to the far discounted rate available to serving or retired military officers) but do not consider the views of these residents in planning new projects or in making substantive (or even minor) changes. Take for example the so-called Waterfront Development Project launched by Karachi's Defence Housing Authority. It has increasingly become a matter of much controversy and there are two reasons for this -- both valid. One, that it involves considerable expense and is a grandiose scheme which means that its execution seems to reflect misplaced priorities on the part of its planners, since it would seem more in tune with an urban metropolis in a developed country and not one in as poor a country as Pakistan. Two, that the DHA's claims that the project is going to improve the lives of all citizens and that it is very much pro-people both seem quite exaggerated. And of course, there is the question of aesthetics. A wide cross-section of public opinion, in writing letters to national dailies and in attending meeting organised by resident associations and NGOs have expressed their concern that the project is not really beautifying the beach but making it ugly and, more importantly, inaccessible to the ordinary people of the city, for whom it is supposedly intended.

The ill-advised, ill-planned project has already deprived the people of Karachi of the one place that they could visit whenever they wanted and where one did not have to pay any money. That is all changing. The city's landmark Funland entertainment centre has long been demolished to make way for what is being billed as a new improved park, but one suspects that this is being done to keep the ordinary people -- who used to visit the place before in huge numbers -- out. The beach probably continues to be -- though who knows what the future holds -- Karachi's most popular recreational site although a lot of its old flavour has gone, thanks to the development project. For instance, a walk along it would allow a magnificent panoramic view of the sea and the city's port but this is not possible anymore because of a long and ugly wall that has been built all along the road in front of the shore. There is a new park near the shore but it resembles more of a concrete jungle and is too brightly lit and inappropriately accessorised (with complete replicas of dinosaurs) to make the beach unwelcome, to say nothing of inaccessible.

The fact of the matter is that instead of spending so much money on this, it would have been far better if the DHA had spent this amount on solving the more basic problems of its residents, particularly on addressing the acute shortage of piped water (despite being charged for it). The beach is public property and must remain accessible to everyone. In addition to this, at a wider national level, the government needs to seriously address the issue of extending local government to those living in cantonments, especially where the civilian population has an overwhelming majority.

(Daily The News 16 September 2006)

KARACHI: Privatisation and handing over of public places to foreign investors was against the constitutional and fundamental rights of the people.

Urban planning expert Dr Arif Hasan said that handing over of 14-kilometer long Clifton Beach land to foreign investors to build plazas, office blocks, five-star hotels, marina clubs and other commercial purposes was in violation of the law.

He was speaking on the topic of Privatisation of Recreational Public Places at the Pakistan People’s Secretariat on Sunday.

The noted social scientist lamented that the person becomes further powerful after grabbing the most expensive land in connivance with the high-ups.

He urged the civil society and political parties to come forward to stop the encroachers from grabbing the only beach land, which belongs to the citizens, so that they could not be deprived of the national asset. He said the government did not hesitate for a moment from bulldozing 200-year-old settlements belonging to the poor, but it did not bother to take action against those who have built plazas even on storm water drains.

Arif Hassan pointed out that two major outlets of water to the sea at Mai Kolachi and Korangi Crossing had been filled up with mangrove trees cut down to carve out plots for the privileged.

He strongly objected on the plans of the Defense Housing Authority to hand over the 14-kilometer long Clifton Beach to foreign investors. He pointed out that the land did not belong to the DHA and the residents of sea view and adjoining areas were apprehensive of the construction plans of DHA.

He said that the construction of a park with an entrance fee at the Sea View had already created hurdles for citizens, depriving them of enjoying the natural environment.

“The forced removal of hundreds of vendors, who had been selling eatables along the seaside at an affordable price to the visitors to earn livelihood, was a great injustice,” he said.

“People who used to make and sell fancy items from seashells directly to the visitors have been made to sell these items to a few “authorized” shops,” he said and added that these shopkeepers were charging exorbitant prices from the general public.

“Migratory birds from Africa and Siberia would stop coming to the beach, after the construction of high-rise buildings,” he said.

He quoted article 26 (1) of the constitution saying that access to public places and resorts for entertainment was the fundamental right of the citizens and no person, organisation or state could deprive them of utilising it.

(Daily News 18 September Karachi)

Carving up the beach

The ongoing carving up of Karachi's coastline continues at full speed. On Wednesday it was reported that the federal government has signed a contract with a leading UAE-based property firm to develop two islands off the coast of Karachi and build a model city there with state-of-the-art facilities. According to a senior government official, the deal, which is worth around 43 billion dollars, will enable the construction of a city with "residential buildings, theme parks, offices, just about everything" and that it will be "just like another Dubai". Presumably the government must be excited at the prospect of such sizeable investment making it into the country but this begs the issue, which is that, does a poor country like Pakistan need a "state-of-the-art city" which will be 'another Dubai'? The problem with such decision-making and planning is that it completely ignores the views of those directly affected by such projects and that whatever is decided upon it almost always ignores the views and concerns of the general public.

Of course, the government's response to this criticism may well be that it isn't spending any of its own money and that all of the investment will be made by the foreign company. However, in this particular instance -- and this is the norm -- the land is being provided by the government (which through the Port Qasim Authority will have a 15 per cent stake in the project). The question then is if the projects will immensely benefit one particular government organisation and given past experience there is a great need to exercise caution in this regard in view of the conduct of state enterprises in other ventures where senior officials have commandeered all benefits for their personal gain. The issue also has to do with priorities. In a country like Pakistan, one would expect the government to attract foreign investment -- since that is a much-cherished goal these days -- in building affordable and cheap housing instead of grandiose "state-of-the-art" facilities that presumably only the super-rich -- a negligible but powerful minority in this country -- can afford.

One has to say this kind of planning and formulating projects of this kind is hardly transparent. It also seems part of a disturbing and wholly unwarranted trend by various government organisations (including the Karachi Port Trust and the Defence Housing Authority) to divide up the beachfront between them and proceed to 'develop' it -- which is a euphemism for making it a garish concrete jungle where ordinary Pakistanis (who used to visit the beach in droves till recently) will be kept out of bounds. This new deal also gives rise to many relevant questions, the most obvious one being that what does the ministry concerned -- ports and shipping -- stand to gain out of this and will not there be considerable scope for personal gain for some officials at least? Only a few days ago it was reported in a newspaper that a large stretch of the Karachi coastline, including an area presently under the control of the navy, will be leased out for development of this kind. Who decides all this? Why aren't the views of the public taken into consideration and why aren't projects that cater to the needs of average Pakistanis ever initiated with similar fanfare? Surely, the beachfront development of Karachi, courtesy the DHA, will provide the rich and the moneyed with many opportunities to spend their wealth -- why the necessity to build along the entire coastline into flashy 'state-of-the-art' buildings?

(The News, 29/09/2006)

ISLAMABAD, Sept 27: Pakistan gave approval in principle on Wednesday for Emaar Properties of United Arab Emirates to go ahead with a $43 billion project to build a model city near Karachi.

Emaar, which will have 85 per cent equity in the project, will develop two islands, Bundal and Buddo, near Karachi into a city with state-of-the-art facilities, Ashfaque Hasan Khan, an adviser to the prime minister, told reporters.

“It will be just like another Dubai,” Khan said. “It will consist of everything. Residential buildings, theme parks, offices, just about everything.”

“We want to build it because it will create new jobs, bring in investment, create new housing and a new city,” he added.

Pakistan’s Port Qasim Authority will hold 15 per cent in the form of land, Mr Khan said after a meeting of the Economic Coordination Committee, the country’s top-decision making body on economic issues.

The project is expected to take about 13 years.

Mr Khan said approval in principal for the project had been given after all formalities were completed.

Legal documents would be completed within three months.

(Daily Dawn, 28/09/2006)

"The natural assets of Karachi have been completely usurped by the rich"

Renowned architect and urban-planner, Arif Hasan (Chairman, Urban Resource Centre) talks to Kolachi about the concerns and controversies regarding DHA's 1.5 billion dollar Waterfront Development Project

By Bilal Tanweer

Arif Hasan is one of Pakistan's few internationally known architects and planners. He is also a teacher, social researcher, and writer. But he is primarily known for his involvement with low-income settlement programmes like the Orangi Pilot Project. Being an urban planner, his NGO, the Urban Resource Centre is often in the eye of the storm vis a vis Arif's continued opposition to the way the authorities are developing Karachi. After fighting a battle against the Lyari Expressway, he is now heatedly opposing the Karachi Waterfront Development Project initiated by the Defence Housing Authority. Kolachi asked him why?

Kolachi: What is your main concern regarding the Waterfront Development Project?

Arif Hasan: The development that is taking place cannot give access to this area to the vast majority of Karachi. Besides, fishing communities will also be affected, and the impact on environment is unknown. No Environment Impact Assessment has been undertaken yet.

The DHA saying that only 20 per cent of the beach will be used for private access, is a whole lot of rubbish. If you study the plan you will see that 80 per cent will in no way be accessible to the general public. This is high-income development meant for the rich. Even if the beach is not being privatised, the nature of the development will restrict access of the beach to those who can pay.

Kolachi: Having said all this, don't you agree that eventually economic forces determine the course and nature of development?

AH: This is entirely untrue. This was true in the '50s. But in the '60s and '70s there was a whole environmental movement - Hu Yan in Vietnam, Pattaya and Keron Beach Thailand, Phuket as a whole. It is untrue. There is no denial of access between the road and the water. There is a construction of facilities on the beach but that happens with the natural environment intact. I have no problems if they want to develop a jungle of concrete on the other side of the road. They are welcome to do it. But the area between the road and the sea, they should leave alone.

However, they have already encroached upon it. They have already reclaimed the wetlands that should have been guarded for the people of Karachi, so that they may be able to go and see the flamingos, the cranes, the pelicans that used to come here in large numbers. But the Defence Society has driven them out. I do not agree with this idea.

It is universally recognised in all development that except in isolated instances, you cannot deprive people of the beach and the sea. It is a well-understood doctrine, 'the doctrine of public trust'. So I would challenge the DHA to show me where this has happened. The only place this has happened recently is in Sri Lanka, where a 3 km stretch has been taken over by private hotels, etc and there have been protests against it. And besides, why do we have to imitate the worst available examples of social and physical development? Don't we have brains?

Kolachi: There is confusion regarding the key players in this project. KPT, DHA, City Government and Karachi Cantt - all seem to have something to do with it. Can you clarify this?

AH: Look, it is very clear that the land either belongs to the KPT or the Port Qasim Authority. Now what arrangements they have between the DHA and the City Government is unclear. Certain things, however, are clear. They have to have an Environmental Impact Assessment, but they don't have it. No such thing. They have not done it. Not only this, before they started this whole reclamation project which destroyed the wetlands, they needed to have an Environment Impact Assessment, but they did not do it then either. Also, they have taken the coast with the Marina Club and all these hotels they have built there, and are not allowing anyone any access to this beautiful stretch where we used to fish once. Why should we believe that they will provide access to people on this project?

Kolachi: There seem to be two dimensions to this: one relating to the access of the people, and the other being the environment.

AH: Yes. Modern urban planning has demonstrated that there is a need for developing a process whereby the natural environment is not destroyed. It should be preserved for the residents of the city. Unfortunately, in Karachi's case, the natural assets of the city have been completely usurped by the rich.

Mangroves near the Mai Kolachi bypass, which were enormously rich in fish and bird life were reclaimed to build the KPT housing colony. It is a crime, which would not have happened anywhere else - except, maybe in Dubai. The wetlands should have been made a sanctuary for the coming generations of this city.

The trend in Karachi has been that the more valuable the land more powerful the usurper.

Kolachi: So, where do you think is the fundamental problem? Is it in the structure of the state or corrupt officials?

AH: The problem fundamentally is in the decision-making process. The people at the helm of affairs are both greedy and uncultured, and they have no respect for people nor do they have roots in reality. The second reason is that in Karachi, there are no planning institutions. Plans which were made were never implemented. For instance, there is something called the Karachi Coastal Management Plan. It was a part of the Karachi Development Plan 2000. If you look at the provisions and recommendations of that plan, this project goes completely against it. Because in that plan it is very clear that there will be no development between the roads and the beach, that natural assets will be protected and integrated for the benefit of people. These plans never became law, for if they would have become law it would have been become difficult for our rulers to loot and plunder land as they have.

Take for example, Karachi Scheme 33 where many thousand acres of land, meant for public amenities, was commercialized. Another example is the area between Dalmiya and University Road. This was planned as a recreational and entertainment area . And this has been allotted to housing schemes, and some judges have houses in this area. So, the only way you can resolve these problems is to develop institutions whereby decisions can be taken in consultation. Otherwise this loot and plunder will continue.

Kolachi: Coming back to the Waterfront Development Project, it is usually argued by the advocates of such mega-projects, in this case involving 1.5 billion dollars, that it will create jobs for the poor. How do you respond to this argument?

AH: There is unemployment because jobs available today require a certain set of skills that are not available, because institutions that can train people in those skills are not present. So if these advocates are so serious about job creation then why don't they setup these institutions at a fraction of this project's cost?

But the funniest argument that these people have given is that if they do not undertake this Waterfront Project, the beach will turn into a katchi abadi. Now I have worked in lower income settlements for many years, and I can tell you that not one inch of land can be occupied without the approval of the authorities and officials involved. So either the Defence Society lot are remarkably incompetent or they are corrupt. Otherwise what they say is not possible.

Kolachi: There is a growing perception that the kind of development being undertaken in Karachi is modelled on cities like Dubai, designed to attract foreigners. How do you look at this?

AH: Anyone who is a student of cities and urban development will understand the three principles of urban development:

1. The development has to respect the ecology of the region in which the city is situated

2. Its land use has to be determined on the basis of environmental and social considerations - and not on land-value.

3. It should benefit the majority, which in our case are the lower and lower-middle income groups, that constitute over 70 per cent of Karachi's population.

Cities which have not done this and have done what our rulers are trying to do, have become cities of violence, crime and fragmentation - Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Johannesburg, and a whole lot of others. Do we want Karachi to become like this, where foreigners have special zones with armed guards and the rest of the city is inaccessible? We are already becoming like this. The Karachi elite lives in ghettos and have ghettoized themselves, protected by armed guards. Their children don't go to the zoo, they don't go to Karachi Museum - they don't even know there is a museum in Karachi - they don't go to Aladdin Park. Now if we want to promote this further, then we go in for projects such as these.

The Project

DHA's multi-billion dollar Waterfront Development Project is planned over a stretch of 14 kilometres of land from Sindbad (Old Casino) up to the Golf Course. The plan divides the coastline into seven distinct zones (A to G). The plan envisages high-rise commercial building complexes, hyper marts, food courts, cinema, amusement park, five-star hotel, an underwater world with a Dolphin Park and aquarium, amphitheatre complex with a capacity of 6,000 people and water sports facilities. The plan also includes a 600-feet Monumental Tower, with a revolving restaurant and observatory deck. Besides this, a Water Park with water sports, rides, swimming zones and a wave island is planned on 11 acres of land. The plan also allows for viewers' deck, parks, a promenade and piazzas but these public access areas seem to make a very small part of the plan.

How the DHA views it

Excerpts from DHA Karachi's website and brochure

"In Karachi, DHA has a virgin, unspoiled waterfront of nearly 14 km ready with full potential for development... The residents of Karachi will soon see a qualitative change in their lives and their concept of relaxation, style and fun.

Fire of creativity and imagination is promising to make Karachi beachfront a much sought-after tourist destination in the foreseeable future. Entirely practical and wholly realizable projects will have a deep impact on the lifestyle of the people of Karachi whose perception of enjoying the sea at present consists of riding a camel or a horse or just taking a walk on the wet sand and watching the waves crash on the shore. They will soon have access to multiple recreational activities within their reach."

A people's history of Seaview according to Arif Hasan

Splitting the beach in two

Historically, the most popular beach in Karachi was located adjacent to the Jehangir Kothari Parade, as you come down from Abdullah Shah Ghazi's tomb. It was popular because people, who used to visit the tomb, after making their offerings, would then go to the Playland, which was located between the tomb and the beach. Gradually, a whole culture developed on the beach.

There were water sellers for washing your feet after you had dirtied them on the shore, you could sit on a chair inside the water, there were chat and bun-kabab sellers, fortune-tellers, monkey and parrot waalas, chand maaris - where you could shoot at the photos of Indian stars for a few rupees. This was a world unto itself. And just before the beach, there was a lane where there were about 182 hawkers and shops-on-carts selling sea-shells.

Another area which developed alongside this beach was the one between the present McDonald's and Salt n' Pepper. This became a more exclusive beach where people would wander away from the former beach to get away from noise, commotion, etc. And gradually a less commercial culture developed there. It became the place for young couples to go, and for people to picnic. Here, the vendors were roving hawkers, rather than those on carts.

Things were like this, when the Defence Society made its intervention in the area between McDonald's and Salt n' Pepper restaurant. They made an embankment, they made a low wall, put up steps, lights and this beach became a very attractive place. But it came at a price for the lower income groups, because they banned all monkey waalas, all roving hawkers and vendors on carts. Instead they put up kiosks, and only allowed certain branded ice-cream hawkers. If you draw a comparative price list of pre and post-intervention, you will see why lower income groups stopped going to the beach, except when they got their salaries at the beginning of the month.

All the hawkers and others shifted to the other beach which became popular as the Ghareebon ka Saahil (beach of the poor), and so this beautiful beach which was developed was denied to lower income groups because of prices.

If the DHA police found hawkers on its side of the beach, it would confiscate their goods and put those hawkers in a car and then dropped them off 7-8 km from this beach, in an area where there is no transport and they had to walk all the way back. Otherwise, the DHA police used to beat them up. And this is the way the DHA discouraged lower income groups to come here, and quite successfully.

Beach Park

Then came the city government, which made a park where you could only enter if you paid 10 rupees for an adult and 5 rupees for a child. Hawkers could not enter either the park or the sea. All the people who were coming here from Abdullah Shah Ghazi's Mazar were deprived of their cheap entertainment at Playland and at the beach.

This led the hawkers and the vendors to shift to the DHA beach. And since they kept coming in very large numbers, it was impossible for the DHA to stop them. With the effect that eventually, the DHA Police and the DHA contractors resorted to taking bhatta (illegal tax) from these vendors.

The vendors on carts were very well-organized. They had their own security system. Their carts used to stay at the beach at night. But now they have all shifted to the lanes on the other side of the park. Now they pay twice the amount of bhatta - illegal tax - they used to pay before this intervention.

What I am trying to drive at by all this is that these are the factors that have to be kept in mind if you want the beach to be accessible to the majority of the population of Karachi, and these needs can be planned for. You can have areas where all these hawkers, vendors, fortune-tellers, bun-kabab sellers can setup their stalls; but none of this is even considered. It is what you might call a 'gentrification' of the beach.

Fishing Communities

Near Korangi and Gizri Creeks, you have villages of Ibrahim Haideri, Akbar Shah Goth, Goth Haji Ayub, Chashma Goth, Jumma Goth, etc. People from these villages have been fishing here on this coast (in waters across the sea-view) for centuries.

Now with the development of these areas and the reclamation of land it has become increasingly difficult for them to fish on this coast. If the authorities want, they can develop the beach in a manner so that the fishing could continue. As a matter of fact, the fishing activities can be integrated in the development of the beach - as it happens in many other countries. But for that you need a certain amount of natural environment. So these communities have lost their livelihoods as well.

(As told to Bilal Tanweer Daily The News News on Sundays 1 October 2006)

KARACHI , Oct 3: Fishermen living in the coastal delta region have vowed that they would oppose the new city project on Bundar and Buddo islands, located close to Port Qasim, as it would deprive eight million fisherfolk of their age-old habitations and rights of fishing besides causing serious environmental destruction.

This was announced by Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum Chairman Mohammad Ali Shah while addressing a news conference at the Karachi Press Club on Tuesday.

He declared that fishermen would launch a movement to resist the mega project. In this regard, he said, a consultative meeting with the community of the coastal belt would be held on Oct 6 at Ibrahim Hyderi. He said another consultative meeting with civil society organisations, social and human rights activists, journalists and citizens was planned for Oct 9.

The fishing community has also planned a huge public gathering after Eid to reiterate its historical claim defending economic and other rights.

It was a clear indication that after Balochistan where a large number of fishermen had been uprooted from Gwadar following the development of deep-sea port, people of Sindh were being threatened by the regime’s policy of mercantilism.

Mr Shah said that the federal government had recently entered into a contract with the UAE-based firm for the construction of a new city on the pattern of Dubai . It handed over 12,000 acres of land to the UAE firm for this purpose. He said the estimated cost of the project was 43 billion dollars.

Opposing this “devilish plan”, the PFF chairman was of the view that it would cast colossal negative impact on the lives of local fisherfolk and therefore the project was “totally inhuman and illegitimate in its essence”.

Mr Shah claimed that it would render the entire marine ecological system unsustainable and hundreds of fishing grounds would be annihilated. The unemployment ratio among the poor fisherfolk would increase, he said. Besides, the mangrove forests, which were already under threat, would suffer more with the development of a new city . He expressed apprehension that this would encourage new investors to occupy hundreds of islands in the 17 creeks along the coast of Sindh .

Mr Shah said that ironically the federal government had negotiated the contract on its own without informing the Sindh government, as stated by the chief minister. He said that when the new city would be developed the ravine channel passing through the two islands would be closed for fishermen.

He said that the PFF condemned the decision and appealed to media, human rights and development experts to immediately intervene into the matter and save the lives of the poor people of these islands.

Haji Shafi Mohammad Jamote also supported the PFF’s stand and expressed surprise over the manner in which the federal government had handled this matter without consulting the chief minister of Sindh.

Dr Aly Ercelan of PILER said that the government’s decision was violation of Land Acquisition Act.

(Wednesday, October 04, 2006)

Fishermen to fight against two new island cities

KARACHI : The fishermen of Karachi are planning a campaign against the federal government’s decision to allot two islands near the city to a UAE-based company, declared the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF), PILER, Fishermen Cooperative Society (FCS) director at a press conference at the Karachi Press Club Tuesday.

The federal government recently handed over 12,000 acres of land to the UAE firm for the construction of the cities. The twin islands of Bundar and Buddo are located close to Port Qasim and the cost of the project has been estimated as US$43 billion.

“The federal government’s decision is in sheer violation of human rights and dignity. The PFF will have a consultative meeting with the fishermen of Karachi coastal areas on October 6, in addition to a consultative meeting with civil society organizations, human rights activists, journalists and citizens on October 9,” announced PFF Chairman Muhammad Ali Shah.

These meetings would review and discuss the agreement between the government and a UAE-based firm to construct new coastal cities on the two islands.

He said that the fishermen have been treated as second-class citizens since Independence . “Not even an iota of consideration is given to them in terms of protection and respect for their rights, such as the right to a livelihood, the right to health and the right to education. They have been systematically deprived of the right to live,” said FCS Director Shafi Muhammad Jamot.

Their rights have disappeared in the form of polices and practices for so-called development intervention in the country, they said. Mega projects have always been injudicious, illegitimate and cruel, he said.

The FCS director said that these development projects will benefit just a few rich people at the cost of thousands of lives. An estimated three million fishermen have suffered due to ‘development’ projects, he added.

Ali Arsalan, a representative of PILER, said that the PFF and PILER strongly condemned the decision as the project would have a colossal negative impact on the lives and livelihood of local fishermen.

“The construction of the new cities will result in poverty and hunger among thousands of fishermen,” said PFF Secretary General Saeed Baloch.

Besides the destruction of the basic and traditional sources of livelihood, he said, it would disturb the entire marine ecological system.

Baloch said that mangroves forests would also suffer. “The federal government has signed the contract without informing the Sindh government,” he added.

Saeed Baloch
General Secretary PFF

The public trust doctrine principle guarantees public access to beaches even if they are privately owned. It holds that water and the sea shore belong to the people who have the unquestionable right to access and use for traditional purposes including fishing, swimming and recreation. Pakistani courts have dealt with the doctrine of public trust. It is well settled that natural resource like air, sea, water and forests are like public trust. 

The DHA project is a clear violation of the doctrine of public trust principle. By building commercial complexes, monumental towers, amphitheatres, amusement parks, food courts, expo complexes, residential and hotels facilities, motels and residences, all for “aristocratic living” bang on the water front, the beach is being denied access to the public.    

The project is in violation of Section 12 of the Environmental Protection Act 1997 and also in violation of Section 4 of the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency Regulations 2000. The project must have an environmental assessment under the laws as the beaches are also included as sensitive areas.

In its recent judgements the Supreme Court of Pakistan has interpreted Article 9 of the Constitution, that is the right to life in a positive manner. It enjoins on the state to take positive steps to promote the quality of life of all its citizens.

The DHA project only promotes the well being of those who can use and afford the facilities it is offering.

The authority of the DHA is to be questioned to give away land held in public trust. The stretch of 14 kms falls within the jurisdiction limits of KPT or PQA.

The DHA is already discharging sewage into Clifton Bay. It is also incapable of managing the solid waste issue along the beach. Its proposed development is going to add enormously to both the sewage and solid waste management issues.  This has already affected marine life adversely.   

To preserve bio-diversity and the natural environment development between the coastal road and the beach is not undertaken anywhere in the world except in isolated locations. It is because of this concern that the Coastal Management Plan for Karachi, which was part of the Karachi Development Plan 2000, advocated that no development should take place between the coastal roads and the Karachi beaches. The DHA is already violating this provision.

After the DHA project is implemented the people of Karachi will not only be unable to access the beach in its natural condition, but will not longer be able to see the wild life which visits the beaches during the winter season.

Since times immemorial the residents of Ibrahim Haideri, Akbar Shah Goth, Goth Haji Azia, Chashma Goth, Rehri Goth, Juma Goth and other settlements have fished in Clifton Bay. They still do. The denying of the shore to them and the affect on marine life will deprive them of their income and livelihoods.

By driving away hawkers, jugglers, performers from the stretch between McDoland and the village and replacing them by expensive food outlets, the DHA has already driven away the poor and lower middle class visitors to the Beach. It is obvious that after the concretisation of the Beach with facilities for high income residents, the Beach will no longer be available to the poor and lower middle income groups.

People owning plots and houses along the beach will longer be able to view the sea. They purchased these plots for the specific purpose of being able to view the sea.

Karachi has had a number of cyclones in the past centuries, especially between 1920 and 1932. In 1985 a cyclone bypassed Karachi causing large scale destruction and inundation of areas in the west adjacent to Karachi. A description of the 1902 cyclone is given in the Sindh Gazetteer 1906 and describes how the entire coastal regions and cities itself was flooded due to enormous waves from the sea.

(18 September 2006)

KARACHI, Sept 18: A leading social scientist has slammed the authorities for failing to confront the menace of encroachment of land by influential people, and raised strong objections to the Defence Housing Authority’s plan to hand over the 14-kilometre-long Clifton Beach to foreign investors for raising plazas, office blocks, five-star hotels, clubs and other commercial facilities, indicating that all such things catered to the needs of only rich class.

Mr Arif Hassan, delivering a lecture on Privatisation of Public Places of Recreation organised by the Pakistan People’s Party at the People’s Secretariat on Monday. The sitting was chaired by Rashid Rabbani, President of the PPP, Karachi Division.

He lamented that while the government did not hesitate for a moment to bulldoze 200-year-old settlements of the poor, it looked the other way when even the storm-water drains were occupied by the elite to build their plazas.

Referring to the DHA’s beach development project, he pointed out that already construction of a park with entrance fee at the Sea View had created a hurdle for the ordinary citizens in enjoying the natural environment.

The forced removal of hundreds of vendors, who had been earning their livelihood here for so many decades by selling eatables to beach visitors at very affordable prices, was a great injustice. Moreover, the prices at which these items were available there, were now way beyond the reach of common citizens.

People who used to earn a living through camel and horse rides or monkey shows are all gone. The craftsmen who had until recently been selling their fancy items directly to their customers at the recreational spot have been made to sell the same to the few ‘authorised’ shops at half the prices. These shops are charging exorbitant prices from their customers.

For centuries fishermen have been benefiting from the beach in earning their livelihood but now they have been stopped from doing so. Migratory birds from Africa and Siberia visiting the beach would also stay away due to the construction of highrises there.Mr Hassan pointed out that nowhere in the world construction along the strait between the sea and coastal road was allowed.

Quoting from the Article 26 (1) of the Constitution, he said that access to places of public entertainment or resorts was a fundamental right which no private person, organisation or state could usurp.

While definite laws existed for the protection of access to public places and environment, it was the duty of various organs of the state to enforce these laws. Even a law violating a fundamental right of citizens would be held void under the Article 8 of the Constitution.

Mr Hassan pointed out that the land that was being privatised did not even belong to the DHA. Construction plans on the land between the sea and coastal road were being looked at with serious concern by the residents of Sea View and adjoining areas. He said that the seashore of Karachi which was already highly polluted would get further polluted by the sewage and waste to be generated by these development projects.

He called for joint action by the civil society and political parties to ensure that the only beach belonging to the citizens of all classes was not handed over to local and foreign profiteers.

Speaking on the occasion, Rashid Rabbani said that for the PPP, citizens came first and their interests took precedence over any other consideration. The party has been struggling to ensure that the quality of life of ordinary citizens improved and their fundamental rights protected.

Mr Rabbani said that the PPP would raise this matter at all forums -- the Senate, National Assembly, Sindh Assembly, City Council Karachi, etc., and would even organise public protest if the decision to privatise the Clifton Beach was not reversed.

(Daily Dawn 19 September 2006)

LETTERS in these columns, as well as reports in the media, have discussed various aspects of utilisation of the Seaview Beach. One of these pertains to the livelihood of various vendors who walk along the seashore selling miscellaneous items like nuts , warm ‘channa’, sweet and green tea. Others who provide camel and horse rides to visitors also depend on the visitors to the beach for their earnings.

In addition to their livelihood, which depends on selling various items to visitors, they have been providing a certain colour to the beach environment and have become a part of the cultural milieu of the area.

It is also a fact that these people have been providing a service to the public by providing snacks and tea at very economical rates for more than two decades when there was no organised commercial activity on the seashore like we are witnessing today.

On merit, therefore, one feels that they have acquired a vested right to the area and hence should continue to be a part of the picture presented by our seashore.

The Defence Association Committee, therefore, discussed this aspect with the new administrator, DHA, who took over last month. It augers well for the area that after listening with an open mind he agreed that they should not be deprived of their livelihood, specially considering the state of unemployment nowadays.

In principal, hence, these vendors will continue to be allowed to ply their trade in the beach area. Through your esteemed columns we would like to share this information with our fellow citizens in civil society and journalists who wrote about their plight. If any case where any vendor is still being deprived crops up, the person concerned or vendor can contact us for redressal.

AZIZ SUHARWARDY

Defence Associations Coord. Committee, Karachi

(Daily Dawn, 15/10/2006)

By Qadeer Hussain Tanoli

KARACHI: Member Central Executive Committee, Labour Party Pakistan, Nasir Mansoor has condemned the Defence Housing Authority (DHA)’s multi-billion Waterfront Development Project, which is in words “would only be beneficial to the upper class.”

During an interview with The News on Monday, he said this project would entirely change the demographic composition of Sindh province. “So far no study has been conducted that what would be the impact of the waterfront project on the marine environment,” he noted, adding that it would pollute the sea more. As things stand, the sea front is heavily polluted.

Environmental reports suggest that the sea up to two nautical miles from the coast of Karachi is badly polluted as there is unchecked discharge of industrial waste into the sea. Mansoor said that this mega project would multiply the contamination level in the sea. The labour leader recalled that some time back when Mai Kolachi Bypass was being constructed, mangroves were chopped down which came in the path of the road. The coast is still suffering from the wanton cutting of mangroves.

“Was there any study conducted as to what the after effect of this action would be on the environment?” he queried. He said Nehr-e-Khayyam which is natural storm water drain was narrowed down and plots were allotted alongside the Nehar as it was assumed that there would be no monsoon rains in the city.

He said this time heavy downpour in the city paralyzed life even in DHA which is the most upmarket locality of the city due to blockage of Nehr-e-Khayyam. He said this project would deprive the general public of their entertainment and it would also deprive fishermen of their livelihood. The beach is a great level field where both rich and poor come for recreation, he said.

“The area where the project is being planned is a wetland and it is a universal truth that such wetlands save the city from destruction during cyclones,” he said. He said Badin faced numerous destructions through cyclones in the past as it had no wetlands to protect it.

“Be it Gwadar, Pasni or the coastal belt of Karachi, vested interests have eyes on them to increase profits and they have no concerns with the problems of the inhabitants living there,” Nasir Mansoor said.

He said the authorities concerned who are responsible to plan this project have nothing to do with the fate of fishermen who would be directly affected by the project. Mansoor added there are 1.9 million fishermen in the city who earn their livelihood from the sea. “When Karachi Port Trust (KPT) and Pakistan Steel were planned it was promised to the fishermen that their standard of living would marvelously improve. But, he said in fact they lost what they had due to these projects” the labour leader pointed out.

“We are against mega projects as they could be beneficial for a few persons but they affect public in enlarge for centuries,” said Nasir Mansoor who is also Secretary of the Labour Education Foundation Sindh.

DHA Waterfront is planned over a stretch of 14 Kilometre from Sindbad (Old Casino) up to the Golf Course. The plan divides the coastline into seven distinct zones (A to G). The plan envisages high-rise commercial buildings, complexes, food courts, cinemas, amusement park, five-star hotel, an underwater world with a Dolphin Park and aquarium, amphitheatre complex with a capacity of 6,000 people and water sports facilities.

farwarded by...

S B Khan

Progressive Youth Front (PYF)

Sindh Chapter.Pakistan

www.geocities. com/pyfpk

www.jeddojuhd. com

www.laborpakistan. org

Cell-0092-333- 3280945

Sherbaz_feminist@ hotmail.com

By Ghulam Hasnain

"Fire of creativity and imagination is promising to make the Karachi beach front a much sought-after tourist destination in the foreseeable future. Entirely practical and wholly reliable projects will have a deep impact on the lifestyle of the people of Karachi whose perception of enjoying the sea at present consists of riding a camel or a horse, or just taking a walk on the wet sand and watching the waves crash on the shore,” says a promotional advertisement on the website of Karachi’s Defence Housing Authority (DHA).

          Long-winded though the ad is, it doesn’t even begin to tell the real story. Internal maps for the ‘development’ of the 14-kilometre-long beach strip seen by Newsline – and which begins at McDonald’s Seaview and encompasses the entire beach front up to Phase VIII – which have been leaked out to various property dealers, indicate how Karachi’s existing beach front has been carved into thousands of new plots for the armed forces.

           The developers, meanwhile, have been given permission to reclaim the seabed for their projects. In the case of Emaar, the main developer involved, reclamation stretches as far as half a kilometre into the sea. On this reclaimed land are planned luxury apartments, office buildings, restaurants, hotels, an ice skating rink, water parks and piers for luxury boats and yachts – an awesome collection of upscale facilities suited to the lifestyles of the rich and famous. Thus, while the government claims that 80 per cent of the 14 kilometres earmarked for these ‘development’ projects is for the benefit of the public, it doesn’t explain how the public will muster the resources to access these essentially luxury facilities.

          The DHA has given 75 acres of the beach in DHA Phase VIII to Emaar, a UAE-based development giant. The developer has named the project Crescent Bay and work has already commenced. Hundreds of trucks laden with heavy boulders enter the city daily and dump their cargo into the sea to reclaim even more land than has already been reclaimed, at great ecological peril.

           The developers of the company owned by Sheikh Mohammad, have, according to inside sources, already reclaimed at least 109 acres. On this land, Emaar is set to build 4,000 luxury apartments, a mall and a five-star beach front hotel. The entire area, which includes the beach, will be off-limits to the public – unless they have the bank balance to utilise what is on offer. The exclusive nature of this development was made very clear recently at a briefing about the Crescent Bay project for a select group of investors from Karachi. The foreigner who was giving the briefing emphasised more than once the benefits of the project’s “private beach.”

           What is even more private, however, are the terms under which the beach front has been bartered. Unlike the sale of precious property abroad, and close to home in the UAE, here, the details of the tenders the government claims to have floated, and those of the bank guarantees that are usually associated with transparent transactions, are shrouded in secrecy.

           The question is, does the DHA have the authority to sell beach front property in the first place? According to the Sindh government, the DHA owns certain segments of the area facing the beach, not the beach itself.

          Therefore, the multi-million dollar question is, who owns Pakistan’s coastline? Legally, it’s the Sindh and the Balochistan governments. However, since the DHA is run by the army, the Sindh government is helpless and seems to have no option but to watch silently as their land is usurped and sold.

           So neither does the DHA own the beach nor does it have the power – legally that is – to allow reclamation of land along the beach. While there is, so far, no hard evidence to suggest that a sizeable amount of money has changed hands to award prime stretches of Karachi’s coastline to foreign investors, endless rumours are circulating about multi-million-dollar under-the-table agreements with DHA officials and prospective developers. What is confirmed is the fact that the DHA has doled out the beach front without charging a single penny, contending that once developed, the investors will share the profit with the Authority. Interestingly, investors will have the right to collect loans from financial institutions by pledging this land, for which it has not paid a penny to date.

          A few months ago, a senior Pakistani banker was shocked when private investors approached him, seeking 50 million US dollars to build high-rises on the beach. “I asked them who owned the land. They said, ‘The DHA.’ They then explained that they had been allowed to build skyscrapers there and had been given permission to obtain loans from the banks. I wondered what the bank’s collateral would be. How could I give a loan to people who had probably not even built their own houses, who didn’t own the land and wanted access to public money? So I showed them the door, telling them that once they had clear title to the land, the bank would help them out,” disclosed the banker.

           The DHA’s decision to barter the strip of beach has, in fact, created lot of ‘briefcase businessmen.’ Typically, new tycoons are the sons and sons-in-law of retired intelligence officials, leaders of the city’s underworld, and the high and mighty of Pakistani politics, who frequent the Far East and Middle East in order to get any ‘investor’ with a presentable bank balance to front the money, secure the projects in Karachi and make some quick money for themselves.

           As dubious as the beach front affair is, however, it is just one among others currently unfolding. The Port Qasim Authority (PQA), for example, has decided to sell two of the islands under its control, Bundal and Buddo, also to Emaar. The islands, which can be seen from Defence and Korangi on a clear day, measure about 12,000 acres in total and were sold for a paltry 400,000 rupees per acre. At the moment, access to the islands is only by boat, and so, a 50-million-dollar bridge is being built by the federal government. Essentially, while Karachi, the country’s economic hub, lacks even basic infrastructure, the government has seen fit to squander taxpayers’ money for the benefit of a few.

          If that were not bad enough, Islamabad has now decided to give the historical 2.5-square-kilometre island of Manora to Nakheel, another UAE-based mega-construction firm. According to sources, the memorandum of understanding (MOU) has been signed between the government, the Karachi Port Trust (KPT) and Nakheel.

          Most of the details of the agreement with Nakheel are secret, but senior government officials say that Nakheel will compensate the port and the navy for the loss of its assests from Manora and will also compensate the people who own properties on the small island.

          Nakheel’s plans are, unsurprisingly, not much different from those of Emaar. The firm proposes to develop Manora as a private residential and commercial mini-city with its own private beach. There is also a plan to build a huge bridge connecting Manora to Clifton, so that its privileged residents will be spared negotiating the port traffic.

          Interestingly, long before the decision to sell Manora Island was made public, the land mafia in Karachi had been buying huge chunks of land in and around Hawkes Bay. The moment a bridge connects Clifton with Manora, the area around Sandspit, Hawkes Bay and thereabouts will turn to gold, as the driving time from Clifton or Defence to Hawkes Bay via Manora, free from traffic congestion, will be substantially reduced.

          According to sources, for the last two years, private cartels from South Africa, Dubai and Mumbai have been pumping billions of rupees into real estate in Hawkes Bay and in the process, encroaching on poor villagers’ land on the coastline.

          Everyday, thousands of people, including both Karachiites and visitors to the city, come to Keamari pier, hire a boat for as little as 10 rupees per person and visit the island of Manora. Most of these tourists have no idea that in the next few months this little pleasure will be lost forever, as Manora becomes out of bounds for the public.

          Locals, however, are painfully aware of the situation. While the property owners will be handsomely compensated, there are many residents, including hundreds of boat owners, who don’t own anything. They decided to settle on Manora and the nearby island of Bababhit because their ancestors either worked for the port or were linked with it in one way or another. For them it will be the loss of a way of life. But policy makers in Islamabad obviously do not concern themselves with such matters.

          Meanwhile, the city government of Karachi, perhaps taking its cue from Islamabad, has decided to give what is left of Clifton beach, i.e. the seafront from the old Casino to Oyster Rocks, to private investors for high-rise residential and commercial buildings. The investors have been asked to generate their own power and acquire their own water for their projects.

          The controversy doesn’t stop there – literally. Just as it has given away beach front property it probably doesn’t even legally have jurisdiction over, the DHA is equally nonchalant about disposing of properties that do fall under its control even if they are earmarked for citizens’ needs.

          Three years ago, the DHA allotted a massive piece of land in Defence Authority Phase VIII, reserved for a cemetery, to a foreign company to build luxury apartments. Creek Vista is now almost complete, with each apartment costing about 12 million rupees. What was left of the property for the graveyard was given to some city businessmen to develop a mall and fast food joints on the pattern of those in western cities. So now, the sprawling Phase VIII neighbourhood, which is rapidly being built up and inhabited, will have no place to bury its dead.

          In 2004, the DHA leased about 58,000 square yards of land to a colourful Karachi businessman for a paltry annual rent of 35 million rupees. Originally meant for a park, the land now controlled by the business tycoon is to house a commercial entertainment outlet, containing shops, restaurants, and theatres. The land, worth over 50 million US dollars at that time, was given virtually free of cost on a 100-rupee bond-paper, on the understanding that the beneficiary would pay the conservative annual rent and share a small percentage of its revenue with the DHA. Even at that time, the estimated future earnings were a pittance compared to the cost of the land.

          Shehri, an NGO with environmental concerns, went to court and earned a stay on the property. The case is still in court. If commercialised, the land would now be worth more than 100 million dollars. On DHA maps, this piece of land, which is located next to Masjid-e-Usman, is still shown as a park.

          The saga continues. Since several poor neighbourhoods, housing hundreds of thousands of people, mainly from the labour class, surround the affluent neighbourhoods of Clifton, Defence, Lalazar and its business districts, there are reports that proposals are being floated to have these areas vacated by paying the residents compensation. These residents now sit on some of the city’s most potentially expensive land. However, since their properties mostly comprise ramshackle and poorly built houses measuring from 45 square yards to a maximum of 200 square yards, their neighbourhoods are not properly planned and lack civic amenities, the value of their properties is low. As such, there are moves to entice these people to shift to the outskirts of the city by paying them 10 times the present market value of their properties. With these areas cleared out, the buyers, allegedly, expect to reap a windfall in the process, since once divested of tenants, broken-down structures and garbage, the price of the land will obviously climb many notches.

          The residents meanwhile, are likely to readily agree to the chance of earning a lot more than their property is currently worth.

          It is a supreme irony that the federal and provincial governments have readily bartered away prime property for luxury projects, even while Karachi is on the verge of a complete breakdown with not even its basic facilities functional.

          Small wonder that the city sorely lacks a workable master plan. The last plan that made any real sense was designed 32 years ago, i.e. in 1974. Many independent city planning experts believe the 2000 master plan is a complete failure. In fact, it takes no expert to gauge this, given the acute scarcity of water and power in Karachi. The city’s industrial base continues to shrink as successive governments fail to provide many of the industrial sector’s needs. Commuters waste thousands of gallons of fuel and hours of precious time, stuck in clogged traffic daily, courtesy either broken, potholed roads, often too narrow to accommodate increasing numbers of vehicles, or roads dug up, ostensibly to lay one line or another, but abandoned midway for unknown reasons. Crime is rampant. Construction is haphazard. Parks are scarce, and medical facilities for the public are few and far between. Those that exist, meanwhile, are in an abysmal state.

          Against this backdrop, the mega-developments planned for the city seem nothing short of a travesty. Roland D’Souza of Shehri plans to contest all these projects in court, especially those which are on the beach. “Since there is no money, people are not interested in Karachi,” he says. According to him, the country’s policy makers seem to believe that by selling the coastline and launching high-profile projects, such as Bundal and Buddo islands – which alone will bring in 43 billion dollars to be received over a period of 13 years – more than Pakistan’s entire foreign debt – they will be able to reshape Karachi. That is why, he contends, there is no resistance to these projects.

          There seems to be some merit in this argument, considering that even those directly involved – the MQM for example, which claims to represent 98 per cent of the poor people of Pakistan – have been criminally silent about the bartering away of the precious few recreational spaces the public could hitherto access. Its coalition partner in the Sindh government, for its part, also seems to have no apparent problem with the sale of its beaches or islands.

Ironically, the only problem the Sindh government does have, is the fact that Port Qasim claims Bundal and Buddo islands as its properties. The provincial government maintains the islands belong to it.

          The MOU with Emaar for the sale of the islands was signed between PQA officials, Irfanullah Marwat representing the Sindh government and Emaar representatives. The Sindh government hopes to convince Emaar to deal with it in respect of financial transactions, so that its coffers will be enriched by the deal. While this issue remains unresolved, Sindh government officials demonstrate no qualms about the actual sale of the properties to a foreign investor. “As far as we are concerned Emaar is a lesser evil than the army – and we could benefit substantially by dealing with them,” said a government official.

          However, speaking off-the-record, a senior political figure in the Sindh government blamed the army for these recent developments. “They are taking all these decisions at gunpoint. We can’t do anything,” he disclosed.

          “These things are decided by the President and the Prime Minister. We don’t have any say,” maintained another top Sindh government official.

          The city’s top businessmen and industrialists, meanwhile, are afraid to annoy the MQM or the army by opposing these developments. So except for Shehri and a few concerned citizens, no one from Islamabad to Karachi has raised their voice against the privatisation and commercialisation of Karachi’s coastline.

          The new developments will certainly change the face of Karachi. But if the trend continues, in just a couple of years the majority of the city’s population will not only be even more on the outside looking in than it is now, it will probably only be able to see the ocean – hitherto it’s one respite – on celluloid.

(Newsline November 2006)

By Qadeer Hussain Tanoli

KARACHI: Former Chief Justice of Pakistan Sajjad Ali Shah is the latest, and one of the more prominent voices, who has spoken out on the DHA’s Beachfront project.

In his view, the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) Waterfront Development Project is meant only to please the Western World. He said that the citizenry, which is the real stakeholder, is silent over the issue and would not be able to protest against it.

While talking to The News, the former chief justice of Pakistan stressed on the need to make people aware of the negative impact such projects would have on their lives.

He said that highlighting such issues to create the necessary awareness among the people should be a priority of the political parties.

“The top people in the present regime are the bankers and they give priority to their own benefits in every matter. The privatisation of land is their priority. They are trying to give their reforms a European look, which is being brought into the country through some frontmen,” Shah said.

He believed that few cared for the code of ethics, and, as a result, the rulers of the country were free to do whatever they liked with impunity. He said any thing could and would be done to appease America and its allies.

“Beaches are also supposed to be included in the natural resources category, which are supposed to be owned by the province in which they are situated. The federation has no right to sell the natural resources, that too on such a cheap rate,” the former chief justice stated.

He said before the fall of Dhaka in 1971, the federation used to claim that it had every right on the region’s jute, which it used to sell to earn foreign exchange. Now, as a result of such an attitude, said Sajjad Ali Shah, the jute is no more in the possession of the federation but is solely owned by Bangladesh which was formerly known as East Pakistan.

“Let them follow the West, but then they should also give social security to the people, which has been a topmost priority of the Western world for a long time,” Shah pointed out.

He questioned the validity of the comparisons to Dubai that were used regularly by the authorities concerned to highlight the importance of projects like the Waterfront. He said they do not care to note the even-greater significance given to the provision of justice, jobs, protection and various other facilities to the citizens of Dubai by their government.

“The citizens of Karachi have easy access to only one beach which is a recreational spot for everyone,” he said, and asked what the citizens of Karachi would do when they do not even have access to the beach. He felt that privatisation, of land and other entities, is not the solution for everything and that there should be a study on the performance of organisations that had already been privatised.

“What has been the performance of Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC) after its privatisation? Certainly, it is the consumer that is ultimately paying the price,” Sajjad Ali Shah said.

DHA’s multi-billion-dollar Waterfront Development Project is planned over a stretch of 14 Kilometres of land, which begins from Sindbad (Old Casino) up to the Defence Golf Course.

According to the DHA, the glimmer of creativity and imagination is promising to make the Karachi beachfront a much sought-after tourist destination in the foreseeable future. It claims that such projects are completely practical and wholly realizable, and will have a favourable impact on the lifestyles of the people of Karachi whose perception of enjoying the beach is at present limited to riding a camel or a horse or just taking a walk on the wet sand and watching the waves crash on the shore.

(November 25, 2006  The News)

A large section of Karachi’s populace have demanded that plans to privatize the city’s public beaches should be stopped immediately. This message came out loud and clear from a public walk, which was organized to protest against the privatization of Clifton beach, on Sunday.

Participants in the walk demanded that that plans to privatize parts of the beach be stopped because they take away the right of the people to their beaches, which is not done anywhere in the world.

The walk was organized by Citizens Coalition, a group set up especially to protect Karachi’s beaches from being privatized. A number of respected Karachiites are part of the move to resist plans by the government to privatize the city’s beaches.

This includes public figures, social workers, lawyers, teachers, journalists, showbiz personalities as well as employees from the public and private sectors.

Some government organizations like the Defence Housing Authority of Karachi and the Karachi Port Trust have plans to develop part of the city’s coastline. The ambitious projects involve setting up hotels, restaurants and beachfront properties.

Many people have argued that these high profile developments will take away the right of the people to their beaches and will restrict their entry. Already parts of the city’s coastline, particularly that which comes under the jurisdiction of the DHA has been fenced off so that access to the beach is restricted.

Sunday’s walk was attended by more than 500 participants - men, women and children of varying ages and from different parts of the city. But the message they had was one. They were holding placards inscribed with slogans: “Save the beach, free access to the beaches is our right, this beach belongs to the people, development should be done for all the citizens, protect public interest, and amend beach development plan”.

One participant, Sabiha Agha, told The News that development on the beach would destroy its natural beauty. “Such a development on the beach is tantamount to playing with the fate of fishermen whose livelihood depends on the sea,” she commented.

Another participant, Nargis Rahman, emphasized on the need to create awareness amongst the masses that their costal belt was being snatched away from them. She was of the view that land around Shireen Jinnah Colony was also being privatized but the common people have no idea about it.

Mizan-ur-Rahman, an artist, said that materialization of the projects like the Defence Housing Authority’s waterfront project, would destroy the natural beauty of the coastal belt.

Another participant Syed Ahmed Shoaib said that beaches were considered public property throughout the world, adding, “But how many people of this city could afford to buy a ticket to view the sea which will happen after the privatization of the beach?”

Rabia Shoaib, a teacher, said that development should be done but the interest of the common people should also be acknowledged in this process, which was not being done in waterfront developments.

She said beaches happen to be the cheapest recreational spots for Karachiites, adding, privatization of Clifton beach would certainly deny access to the common people.

“Our forefathers did not wage freedom struggle and sacrificed many lives so that after the freedom of the country its land should be privatized on throwaway prices,” remarked a female participant.

Salim Muhammad said that all the people in the walk were the genuine demonstrators and they were not hired on money. “We have come together for a noble cause to record protest against the privatization of beach,” he added.

Shahid Fayaz stressed the need for strengthening anti-privatization campaign for the beach on long-term basis. “A couple of demonstrations would not build pressure on the authorities concerned to stop the privatization of the beach,” he said.

Bitterly criticising those involved in selling the beach, he said these bodies happen to be more powerful and much stronger than the protestors. Another participant said that everything appears to be put on sale in this part of the world, while no body cares who would be deprived of from what.

The walk started from McDonald Park on Sea View, and after covering the way till Kinara Restaurant, it returned to the same spot.

The participants, a large number of whom came from the nearby DHA and Clifton areas, also tried to convey their message to common citizens who had come to the beach to celebrate their weekend there. The participants kept on chanting slogans against the privatization of the beach throughout the walk.

(By Qadeer Tanoli, The News-13, 16/04/2007)

The DHA plans to construct theme parks, marinas, expo centres, expensive hotels, and condominiums on the 14-kilometres of beach area between McDonalds and the Golf club. Pakistanis of all backgrounds currently enjoy this area, which will no longer be the case once the project is completed.

The citizens of Karachi have been campaigning and demanding for the immediate end of DHA's Beach Development Plan and its implementation as it prevents the common person's free access to the beach, contravenes the law, and shall cause immense environmental damage.

The Sindh High Court in its judgment in CP No D-103/2005 has stated as follows: (i) "the DHA is bound to consider public interest while developing the Clifton Beach". (ii) "All over the world, beaches and waterfronts have been developed but in a manner so to allow free access to the same by the public and so as not to obstruct a view of the beach and the sea". (iii) "The doctrine of public trust has long been recognised all over the world, which enjoins the state to preserve and protect the public interest in beaches, lakeshores etc". (iv) "We direct that all the public areas viz walkways, promenades, etc, should be made available to the public at large free of cost". (v) It also directs that the EPA issues relevant permissions under the Environmental Protection Act.

The Karachi Coastal Management Plan, prepared in 1989 by the KDA Master Plan Department with UN assistance, as part of the Karachi Development Plan 2000, had recommended a 50-metre construction free accessible zone beyond the high water mark.

In light of the above, we demand that the DHA and Environmental Protection Authority follow The Karachi Coastal Management Plan, and fully adhere to the judgment of Sindh High Court in letter and spirit and amend the current plan in accordance with the same. Under the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act, 1997 (PEPA) any project of sufficient size has to undergo an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and a no objection certificate (NOC) obtained from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) before the project can proceed. No review of an EIA can be conducted without consultation from a committee of experts constituted by the EPA. No such committee of experts has been formed or consulted for this project. The regulations under PEPA also requires for the results of the EIAs to be presented before the citizens in a public hearing for their comments on the project and its EIA. These comments are to be considered before any final decision on the EIA.

This development if it were to happen as originally planned will destroy the natural environment of the coast and will make almost the entire beach inaccessible to the citizens of Pakistan, especially to the low and lower middle income communities who will not be able to afford the cost of the expensive entertainment being proposed and will be excluded simply by the nature of developments that are to be implemented.

No one can take away the right of the citizens of Pakistan to access their beach. Under international and domestic law, the beach area is for public use and everyone, regardless of income, has the right to free access to the beach without obstacles or interference. This is a principle enshrined in the public trust doctrine.

We strongly oppose a development plan that will finish off the only natural multi-class recreational space available to Karachites and as a result will further socially fragment an already fragmented city. The beach is a public spot we share with the many hundreds of thousands of our countrymen who visit Clifton Beach every week and belong to all classes and ethnic groups. A plan that shuts out a majority of Pakistan's population is unacceptable.

We have already seen the "gentrification" of the beach by the imposition of a fee of Rs10 per person as entry to Beachfront Park. This park controls access to the beach and therefore prevents low and lower-middle income citizens from enjoying the beach. We cannot allow any further such developments.

We are not against theme parks, marinas, expo centres and expensive hotels and condominiums, but it is our considered opinion that for environmental and social reasons the area between the coastal road and the high water mark should be encroachment free, construction free and accessible to the public free of cost as is the case in other South and South-East Asian countries and in the developed world. We have had free and unrestricted access to Clifton Beach and future generations should also enjoy the same benefit.

We derive strength from the fact that 4,665 persons belonging to 73 CBOs and NGOs from all over Pakistan and individuals belonging to 89 low and lower middle-income areas of Karachi have supported the concerns of the Sahil Bachao Movement whose concerns are similar to ours.

We urge all concerned citizens to support our cause and visit and sign our online petition at:

http://www.petitiononline.com/oursahil/petition.html

(By Arif Belgaumi, The News-6, 24/04/2007)