Lockdown did not yield any result in Sindh: Vawda

KARACHI: Lashing out at the Sindh government for “its failure in countering the coronavirus situation effectively”, the two federal ministers from Karachi on Sunday said that because of incompetence and lack of coordination of the Pakistan People's Party’s provincial government, the ongoing lockdown in the province for past 20 days did not yield any results.

Federal Minister for Maritime Affairs Ali Zaidi and Federal Minister for Water Resources Faisal Vawda on Sunday spoke to the media at two separate conferences to show their concerns over the Sindh government's policies regarding efforts to limit the spread of coronavirus and enforcing lockdown, particularly Saturday’s hurried announcement of sealing 11 union councils in the city’s various areas. Zaidi was accompanied by Firdous Shamim Naqvi, the opposition leader in the Sindh Assembly, MNA Aftab Siddiqi, and Mahmood Mauvli, Advisor Ministry of Maritime Affairs, while Vawda was accompanied by Malik Shehzad Awan, a PTI MPA from his constituency of Baldia Town.

Federal Minister Zaidi in his presser slammed the PPP-led provincial government over its lax attitude towards the province's health sector. Zaidi said that after the 18th Amendment, the health sector had been devolved to the provinces and now it was the responsibility of provincial governments to deal with it. “But despite that, the federal government has been arranging testing kits, providing financial assistance and taking other steps.” He said that the chief minister and his cabinet ministers are lying to the media in the meetings. He claimed that Sindh lags far behind in health facilities if compared to other provinces. “PPP could have established a state-of-the-art hospital for the people in the past 12 years of its rule in the province,” he said. “No ventilator is available in hospitals in upper Sindh and only two isolation centres are established there.” Zaidi also appealed to industrialists and factory owners not to lay-off workers at the crucial time.

Naqvi on the occasion reiterated his suggestion to the Sindh government to consider easing the lockdown after ensuring the implementation of a code of conduct regarding the coronavirus pandemic and said that factories, which could implement guidelines, should be allowed to work. “Industries are open and operating in the US and Europe,” he said.

“The provincial government has been making decisions without homework and then takes them back,” said Naqvi, while mentioning the Saturday's decision to seal entire UCs in District East. He said that observing social distancing is not possible in Karachi’s slums and the Sindh government itself claims that 40 percent of the city consists of slums. He asked Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah to revisit his decision of closure of OPDs in the province’s state-run hospitals.

Later, Vawda, in his press conference, criticized the Sindh government's Saturday's decision to seal and cordoning off the 11 UCs of District East and said that instead of making genuine efforts to deal with the pandemic, the chief minister and his cabinet were sitting in air-conditioned rooms and taking inappropriate decisions. “How can the provincial government keep 0.7 million people in District East off the roads while they cannot handle 70 people,” he questioned. He said that the Sindh government has failed to counter the coronavirus situation effectively and was only carrying out lip service.

“Because of the Sindh government’s incompetence, the number of confirmed cases of coronavirus are rising,” the federal minister said. “The Sindh government needs to see what is happening in other cities, including Hyderabad, Larkana and Jacobabad.” He said that even personnel of police and paramilitary Rangers have not been provided sanitizers.

He said the provincial government had failed to implement the lockdown effectively in Karachi and the rest of the province. “I don’t want to engage in politicking at such a critical time, but I had no choice. I assure the residents of Karachi that the PTI stands with them.”

Vawda said that the Sindh government should explain where it used the funds that were collected by private donors and provided by the federal government. “Where is the Rs2 billion that was given to help the people? The people are dying of hunger,” he said. He alleged that the PPP’s provincial government has been distributing the expired cooking oil in ration among the poor people.

Vawda pointed out that corruption in funds is rampant in Sindh and money allocated for poor people is being provided after deduction. “Deduction of Rs1,000 from Rs12,000 is injustice with the poor people who are badly affected because of lockdown. We will not let the Sindh government carry on like this anymore and if it did not take concrete measures, the PTI ministers will be compelled to distribute money to deserving families individually.

“Lockdown of the province is not a solution to curb coronavirus. People will die of hunger,” he said. He said that the government should take traders into confidence and announce the SOP of the lockdown. He said that Ehsaas and Tiger Force initiatives are the beginning of the federal governments' efforts. “We have several plans to counter the coronavirus spread and it will be launched in upcoming days.”

Meanwhile, Sindh Education and Labour Minister Saeed Ghani said on Sunday the Sindh government can go to any extent to save the lives of people from the pandemic as human life is more important than economy or livelihoods. He was responding to a question during a press conference. He had been asked whether the provincial government was considering to extend the lockdown beyond April 14. He, however, conceded that any decision regarding the lockdown would be a tough call for the provincial government.

Ghani said it would be better if the provincial and federal governments and political parties were on the same page to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. He said those ruling in the Centre were yet to realise the importance of protecting human lives and the harsh measure of lockdown was taken only to achieve that.

The Sindh government had also imposed a ban on distributing rations among the needy families on roadsides, he said, adding that the method adopted by the federal government to disburse cash through the Ehsaas programme among the needy families was also highly risky as it could become the cause of further spread of coronavirus infection.

He said only a designated bank and 6,000 to 7,000 spots had been selected all over the country to distribute cash under the Ehsaas programme and such a method was bound to attract crowds of people in violation of the precautionary measure of social distancing being advocated worldwide.

He said the federal government should have instead enlisted the services of all the commercial banks, postal services and mobile phone companies to disburse cash to the deprived people in a regulated manner so that it could be achieved without large assemblies of the poor. He said the decision of the Sindh government to seal certain union councils in the city having higher number of COVID-19 cases came under undue criticism by some quarters as similar measures earlier taken in Lahore had been praised.

He claimed that the Sindh government had enlisted the services of charities and welfare organisations to provide rations to the needy people and in this connection, ration packs had been distributed among over 200,000 deprived families during the COVID-19 emergency.

Ghani said the airports in Pakistan lacked emergency screening measures to detect suspected COVID-19 patients coming from abroad. He added that the federal government should immediately seal the borders to stop the local spread of the COVID-19 infection.

Also speaking on the occasion, Sindh Information and Local Government Minister Syed Nasir Hussain Shah said the federal government lacked the required seriousness to deal with the COVID-19 emergency. He said federal ministers had been unduly criticising the steps taken by the Sindh government to tackle the COVID-19 emergency in order to cover up their own inefficiency.

He said federal ministers, MNAs and MPAs of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf who had been missing from the scene for the last several months had emerged all of a sudden at the behest of the prime minister in order to level baseless allegations against the Sindh government.