Zubair Qureshi
People of Islamabad, particularly women voters on Monday regretted the political parties’ candidates after winning elections in the past elections left the city to the mercy of the Capital Development Authority (CDA), Islamabad Metropolitan Corporation (IMC) and the Islamabad Capital Territory Administration (ICTA) and never bothered to pay attention to the uplift of the city.
During a survey conducted by Pakistan Observer the voters held that previously in 2018 general elections a ‘non-Islamabadi’ Member of the National Assembly (MNA) of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Asad Umar was elected but he remained busy in solving the national issues and had little time to pay attention to the matters related to his constituency.
Similarly, the former Mayor of Islamabad Sheikh Anser Aziz was also imported by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif and had no knowledge of the situation on ground. Both of them failed to deliver and the capital’s infrastructure, health, education, housing and business sector suffered enormously.
Islamabad remains unattended and the two hospitals—Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) and thePolyclinic Hospital—- that were established decades ago when Islamabad’s population was around 700,000 are still there to cater to the needs of 200,000. Problems have increased and resources have depleted and the city no longer claims to be among the top capitals of the world and presents a shabby picture of a neglected city.
The successive governments of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), the PTI had only promises for the federal capital and not a single new hospital was added to the existing hospitals. During the Nawaz Sharif government from 2013-2017, Metro Bus and a number of flyovers and underpasses were built but nothing significant was done in the health sector.
Similarly, the federal capital is still without a state-of-the-art slaughterhouse, a modern prison and sports & community centres.
The butchers have to go to the adjacent villages of Saidpur or Golra to slaughter the animals in unhygienic conditions and bring the meat to the city. Likewise, the accused have to travel daily from Adiala Jail of Rawalpindi to the courts of Islamabad for hearing and no substantive work was done in that direction either.
While talking to Pakistan Observer Jameela Begum a resident of the G-9/4 said she was disappointed with the treatment meted out to the federal capital’s residents by the three mainstream political parties. “They made tall claims, sweet promises but when time comes to deliver they simply turn a deaf ear.”
Take the example of PIMS, she said while quoting a report which says daily 6,000 patients visit the hospital’s Out Patient Department (OPD) and almost half of them return unattended.
This is because these hospitals have limited staff and capacity while Islamabad’s population has increased manifold. The city continues to suffer from incessant power outages for hours and the IESCO landline number either remains ‘busy’ or out of reach when citizens call inquiry desk. Abdul Khaliq, another voter in the NA-47 said his children were going to the FDE schools where no transport is available for pick &drop service nor the building is in good condition.
Hopefully, the new elected representatives of Islamabad will pay attention to the education sector also, he said. We don’t have a good library with audiovisual facilities and children are drifting away to unhealthy activities wasting time.
