A draft roadmap, under Karachi Mega City Sustainable Development Programme, was presented before the stakeholders to improve katchi abadis (KAs) and other low-income housing segments.
The draft roadmap, subject to amendments after "positive" recommendations from the all stakeholders, was presented by Mohammed Zakir, Project Director, Project Support Unit, KMCDP; Roshan Ali Shaikh, Project Co-ordinator, Local Support Unit, KMCDP and Shafiq-ur-Rahman Paracha, Chair, Multi-Stakeholders Expert Working Group in their respective speeches at a Multi-Stakeholder Workshop held in Hotel Awari Towers, here on Friday.
The "deliberations" based event remained without keynote address as City Nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal could not attend the workshop. The City District Government Karachi (CDGK) and the Sindh Government organised the consultative workshop in collaboration with the Asian Development Bank to make the draft popular by getting recommendations from the key stakeholders including the city and provincial governments, financial institutions and the civil society.
The CDGK officials said that under the roadmap people would be provided houses on comparatively low prices from the private builders and the city would be made slum-free by 2020.
The participants of the workshop, categorised into small groups, rejected, debated and accepted various proposals in the areas of institutional framework and concerns regarding roadmap, low income housing, Katchi Abadis and public awareness and role of citizens.
The document underlining the current and future situation in the metropolis expressed concern that the existing 15.12 million population would be doubled to 27.550 million by 2020 while the number of households climbing to 3.9 million from the current 2.2 million giving a substantial boost to the demand for new housing, most for low-income groups.
Small group suggestions on the KAs included a speedy, indiscriminate, transparent and easy lease process of the all KAs and old goths, setting December 31, 2006 as the cut-date, newly constructed KAs should have a 30-ft distance from the railway tracks, making the lease rates affordable, regularisation and resettlement of the KAs people, curbing more than 200 yards land ownership, proposals from NGOs, identification of the unregistered KAs and the lease of Goths by the Board Of Revenue.
The government urged to give plots to those got their houses cut, for development purpose, from 50 to 60 yards since they would have less or insufficient place to live. The group on public awareness proposed "corner meetings" in the goths and KAs besides conducting training programmes for the councillors to create awareness among the masses.
Role of electronic media was also urged to help lobby public support and participation in the implementation of "inclusive policy framework". The group also said that the workshop proceedings had brought the huge gap between the government and civil society on the surface.