Pasban Democratic Party (PDP) Chairman Altaf Shakoor here on Sunday demanded that due to apathy of the government to facilitate citizens of the megacity, communities and philanthropists should come forward to make Karachi a livable city.He said the Muslim, Hindu, Gujarati and Parsi communities before creation of Pakistan had done memorable social services for Karachi, giving it schools, colleges, hospitals, parks and other civic facilities on purely philanthropic basis.
He said the megacity needs the revival of that community service spirit.
He said that the government should invest heavily in the social sector, but keeping its previous record in mind one could not expect much from them. He said we need to develop community sense in our society so that the blind dependence on corruption-marred governments could be reduced.
Altaf Shakoor said similarly the idea of community policing should also be developed to fight rising street crime as well as organized offences by different mafias. He said that it is our social responsibility as citizens to work for the betterment of our neighborhoods.
He said if the citizens only refrain from throwing garbage into streets, we can give the megacity a much better look. He said in every part of the megacity shopkeepers and hawkers freely occupy roads and streets.He said even car showroom owners use footpaths and roads as display platforms for their vehicles. He said mechanics use roads and footpaths as their open workshops. He said this all messes up not only the result of poor governance but also the pathetic civic sense of our own citizens. He said when our drivers deliberately commit traffic violations including wrong side driving we should blame not only the corrupt and lazy traffic police but also our own citizens.
He asked the newly elected local bodies’ representatives to ensure improvement of civic facilities at street and ward level. He said not only macro level efforts, but also micro level efforts are required to make our megacity a livable place for the sake of our coming generations.
