Television host Tabish Hashmi has called for placing Karachi under a single authority and suggested privatising the city, saying repeated incidents such as the fire at Gul Plaza point to long-standing governance failures and absence of accountability.
Speaking on a private news channel’s program, he suggested privatisation as an option if governance failures continued. “If the government realised it could not run PIA and decided to privatise it, then Karachi should also be privatised. We, the people of Karachi Pathan, Baloch, Sindhi, Muhajir, Punjabi will handle it ourselves. If this is the current standard of governance, we can run it better, because it cannot be run worse than this,” Hashmi said.
Hashmi said Gul Plaza carried personal significance for residents across generations, recalling its place in everyday life for families in the city. He said the fire reflected how shared spaces in Karachi were being lost one by one.
Safety lapses linked to the incident were not new and should have been identified through routine inspections by relevant authorities. “Across the world, it is the job of departments and local governments to inspect buildings, especially older ones,” he said.
Referring to statements by senior officials following the incident, Hashmi questioned claims of accountability. “Accountability does not happen just because someone says, ‘I am accountable.’ Accountability is a process,” he said. He added that similar incidents had occurred repeatedly over the years. “This was not the first incident. Fires have happened before. Children have died in dumper accidents.”
He also questioned the practice of compensating victims without personal consequences for those in authority. “The compensation that is announced does not come out of their own pockets. It comes from taxpayers’ money. So how is that accountability?” Hashmi said.
Drawing on his experience in senior corporate roles, he said consistent failures would normally lead individuals to step aside. “If someone keeps giving excuses in front of a board or a boss, an educated person eventually realises that maybe they are not fit for that role,” he said.
Calling for structural change, he added Karachi could not function under fragmented control. “Karachi needs to be run under one unified power. When there are 36 different authorities, nothing can work”.