KARACHI: Speakers at a seminar here on Monday urged citizens not to invest in illegal, unregistered housing societies in the metropolis as they called for amending to housing societies laws to prevent irregularities in projects.
They also emphasized the need to bring all the relevant organizations on the same page for the resolution of civic issues in cooperative and public housing societies.
The seminar titled 'Private Housing Schemes/Co-operative Housing Societies: Issues, Prevention & Remedies' was organized here by the Sindh Building Control Authority (SBCA) in collaboration with the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).
Speaking at the seminar NAB Additional Director Karachi Haroon Rasheed lamented that all the bodies concerned have failed in the provision of proper civic facilities to the citizens of the economic hub of the country.
Haroon Rasheed said that lack of planning has ruined the beauty of the city.
He emphasized upon the stakeholders to ensure the management of the land in the metropolis properly.
Haroon Rasheed, talking about the housing societies, said that proper legislation of housing societies is needed. He also stressed that existing laws need to be amended.
The NAB Additional Director concluded that citizens must be facilitated when they approach government organizations. He said people should be properly made aware about the fake housing schemes, and citizens approaching the relevant department to confirm authenticity of such schemes be treated fairly.
Addressing the occasion, Chairman Association of Builders and Developers (ABAD) Hassan Bakhshi said that 58 percent of Karachiites are living in slums and that is a failure of all stakeholders, including the construction industry.
He said that influential people encroach upon government lands with the help of officials and start selling the same to the poor.
He said, "We all have to think out-of-the-box for the resolution of issues of cooperative and public housing societies."
He also urged all the stakeholders to be on the same page for the resolution of issues.
Director (Design) SBCA Nadeem Rasheed apprised the participants of difference between cooperative and public housing schemes.
He said that most of the societies were not providing basic civic facilities to the citizens and some of them had not even allotted possession to the buyers. In many societies, there are no roads or proper sewerage system.
He said that development authorities are not getting their layouts approved from Master Plan section of the SBCA.
Discussing reasons of failures of the housing societies, he said that poor law and order situation in the past also played a role in this regard.
He apprised that the SBCA informs citizens about fake schemes via media and other tools.
The authority has also asked the media not to publish advertisements of fake housing schemes or get their authenticity confirmed prior to publishing their ads.
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