Karachi residents begin cleaning up after floods

Karachi residents began cleaning ruined homes and businesses yesterday after catastrophic flooding sent rivers of water cascading through Pakistan’s largest city, while deadly monsoon weather continued to lash communities across South Asia.
Successive days of storms have exposed the longstanding failures of Karachi’s neglected and overwhelmed drainage system, and residents used a welcome break in the rain to vent their fury at what they see as gross mismanagement of municipal resources.
“Everything got ruined in my basement, with about 3m of water inside. The water is a mix of rain and sewage water. It is the fifth day and we are suffering horribly,” housewife Lubna Salman, who lives in an upscale Karachi neighbourhood managed by the military, the Defence Housing Authority (DHA), told AFP.
Salman and other angry residents, including residents of Clifton, gathered outside the Clifton Cantonment Board (CBC) office to blast officials for failing to fix drainage problems in the city of 20mn people.
Municipal and military managers were “grossly incompetent” for neglecting the city’s sewerage system, Salman said.
Authorities did not immediately comment.
The Clifton Cantonment Board had sealed the gates of its office ahead of the protest scheduled by residents of the area.
Demonstrators breached the premises and tried to enter the office, but were stopped by police.
Angry protesters held up placards and shouted slogans like “Go CBC Go”.
The protesters are demanding that the CBC chief executive address them and listen to their grievances.
Calling for an improvement in the sewerage system, the protesters are also demanding that an audit report of the flood relief tax collected by the CBC be shared with them, and called on the board’s members to be held accountable for the lack of amenities provided to them over the years.
They also demanded that the CBC improve garbage collection services in the area.
Last night, a group formed on Facebook under the name of “Petition against DHA and CBC” announced that they would protest against the authorities of DHA and Clifton outside the CBC office for the ”incompetence of DHA and CBC in providing basic living conditions”.
The organisers had requested everyone to “remain peaceful at all times, not harm or hurt anyone, not damage any property and do not harm any plants or animals”.
The group administrators had clarified that they do not “promote, recommend, encourage or incite any sort of violence, nor shall they be held accountable or responsible for any person’s personal choices or acts in the peaceful protest”.
Karachi last week saw a record 230mm (9”) of rain, compared to the average of 130mm for the time of year, according to the city’s meteorological service.
Videos and images on social media regularly show builders dumping rubble into drainage canals, while shoddy new buildings are erected with scant regard for their effect on maxed-out sewer lines.
With a population of only 500,000 in 1947, Karachi has seen its population mushroom “without investing in invisible infrastructure (pipes and sewerage) for more than 30 years”, Karachi-based urban planning professor Nauman Ahmed said.
During a single day last week, 18 Karachi residents died from flood-related incidents.
The water was so deep in places that children were seen swimming in the streets.
More than 100 Pakistanis died in August because of the monsoon, which has also destroyed more than 1,000 homes.
Rains and flooding have also swept India in recent days, killing scores of people.