MQM demands new provinces: Sindh Assembly's post-budget debate marred by noisy protest

The legislator of Sindh's ruling Pakistan Peoples Party asked the provincial government on Monday to spend gas and fuel oil royalties only on the development of those areas, which produced them and not the entire province. The demand came during the post-budget debate in the Sindh Assembly that continued for the fifth day with opposition mainly the MQM and the ruling PPP's lawmakers' continued protest and hurled allegations against each other. The House plunged into chaos due to noisy protests on the demands for bifurcation of Sindh province.
The PPP's veteran - Mir Hazaar Khan Bijarani slammed the federal government for over 20 hours' daily power outages in rural parts of Sindh. "I strongly condemn the federal government's step-motherly behaviour with Sindh," he lambasted saying that continued load-shedding made the lives of people in Sindh miserable. He expressed hope that the federal government would do needful to end this problem. "The gas and fuel oil royalties should be disbursed only for the development of those areas, which produced them. The royalties should not be part of provincial budget rather specifically be spent on the areas producing the precious natural resources," he urged.
Bijarani also asked his provincial government to build a bridge on Sukkur and Guddu Barrages to help people living on either side of the river Indus. He demanded of the government to install RO plants on Sindh-Balochistan border-belt to facilitate people.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)'s parliamentary leader, Samar Ali Khan said that the budget provided no relief to ordinary people. He feared the province was degrading and continued to fall while the public conditions would not improve. He urged the government to spend budget judiciously to help poor grow.
PML-F's Waryam Faqeer said that the government was increasing budget every year but that had no positive impact on the public living. PML-N's Ismail Raho observed the government had failed to deliver because people were not benefited by its fiscal plans. MQM's newly-elected lawmaker, Mehfooz Yar Khan demanded for creation of Karachi as a separate province in Sindh, proposing that 22 federating units should be formed in the country. During his speech, the PPP members resorted to a noisy protest. PML-F's Imtiaz Shaikh said that Sindh was budget based on a status.
"Rise in the budget allocations for health, education and other sectors is nothing but a drama. These allocations never spent in the past," he said. PPP's Rubina Qaimkhani said that the federal government had ignored Sindh in its fiscal plans for the next financial year. MQM' Syed Waqar Hussain Shah said that the Sindh province would have to divide. "The PPP government presented its ninth budget but people are not getting water to drink," he said, adding that "Hazara, Seraiki and Karachi provinces will have to be carved out." MQM's demand for separate province evoked instant reaction from PPP's Imdad Pitafi who criticised the MQM's lawmakers telling them dismemberment of Sindh was impossible.
Scores of other lawmakers also spoke on the proposed budget 2016-17. Newsmen earlier staged a protest at the press gallery of the Sindh Assembly against the ban on TV channels' live coverage of the proceedings. They had placards in hands read 'stop humiliating journalists on security pretexts.' Despite opposition leader, Khawaja Izhar-ul-Hassan's pointing out to the newsmen protest, Speaker Aga Siraj Durrani refused to 'compromise' on security issues. Latter the house was adjourned till Wednesday morning.