City District Government Karachi (CDGK) has failed to fully carry out activities under the 'I Own Karachi' (IOK) campaign, as only five activities were conducted in 2010. The IOK Campaign was initiated on August 14, 2008 by then City Nazim Mustafa Kamal for the citizens to volunteer in civic and social matters.
The project was started to provide the citizens a platform to own the city by serving the community voluntarily. The response from the citizens was overwhelming as around 27,000 citizens registered themselves as volunteer and help municipal authorities in various areas including cleanliness, health, environment protection, literacy, social responsibilities. Everyone whether a shopkeeper, gatekeeper, businessman or minister can get himself registered with IOK project as "City Owner".
In year 2010, under IOK, only five activities were conducted that include tree plantation in Mazar-e-Quaid with 120 school children in April, tree plantation in Maritime Museum with visitors in May and tree plantation in Kids University with students in October, cycle rally to mark Health Day in April and Free Diabetes Camp at Civic Centre. The mentioned activities were carried out in collaboration with different organisations and were restricted to some specific area.
Apart from these, neither any activity under IOK was carried out in 2010, nor the 27,000 volunteers registered with IOK were utilised. While in 2009, under IOK more than 90 activities were conducted and the volunteers were utilised. Lack of financial support for the project was said be the reason for not c carrying out activities. The incumbent CDGK management does not own the campaign and not extending financial support to it.
Project Director, IOK, Tooba Zareef Khan when contacted told Business Recorder that lack of cash flow was the main reason of not carrying out the activities of the project. However, he said that CDGK and Town administrations were helping IOK in terms of logistic support, she added.
She admitted the failure of IOK and said the IOK was being initially run by CDGK, but in February 2009 the project was outsourced to a private company. She said that the activities in 2010 were all conducted in collaboration with corporate sector. When asked confining the activities to specific areas, Tooba Zareef said that the security was the reason. While pointing out toward misuse of "City Owner" card, she said many of the citizens registered with IOK to get Owner Card, as it has CDGK's logo on it.
IOK is planning to modify City Owner Card to avoid misuse and around 1700 volunteers among the 27000 are active and willing to participate in almost every activity, she added. Tooba Zareef said IOK was focusing on disaster management and youth consultancy in 2011and would also conduct seminars and workshops for creating awareness about different issues.