Center for Peace and Development Initiatives, Pakistan (CPDI), an NGO, has shown serious concern over the poor performance of Ministry of Education in utilising the annual development budget.
The Director of CPDI Mukhtar Ali, in a press conference here on Saturday, lamented the poor performance of the government saying the government has failed in timely planning and executing the projects related to education.
He said the total amount released for development projects in the first quarter (July-September) of 2007 was only Rs 936 million, out of which the education division was able to spend only Rs 498 million.
This means only 7.6 percent of the total budgetary allocation for the year 2007-08 could be spent. While Rs 106 million could be utilised against the release of Rs 596 millions in the first quarter of last year, which was 1.6 percent of total allocation, he added.
He said utilisation of development budget under the Education Division in 2006-07 was only 20 percent of the actual allocation by the end of third quarter in March 2007 and 33 percent by the end of financial year in June 2007.
He apprehended that the Education Division would not be in a position to timely complete development projects during the current financial year if the related inefficiencies were not addressed immediately.
Commenting on the reasons of the low utilisation of the allocations, he said these are: late releases by the Ministry of Finance, delays in site selection and acquiring land, inter-departmental differences, non-availability of staff, failures in appointing full time project directors, delayed consultant reports, late issuance of work orders and late submission of reports or requests for release of funds by the related implementing organisation.
The government has made allocations for 104 development schemes under the Education Division in financial year 2007-08. Out of these, 19 schemes with total allocation of Rs 336 millions remained unapproved until the end of September 2007, which included establishment of 10 Cadet Colleges at the cost of Rs 50 millions, financial assistance of Rs 85 millions for Cadet College, Hasan Abdal, provision of additional facilities at Kasur Public School costing Rs 35 millions and National School Nutrition Programme at the cost of Rs 100 millions, he maintained.
He said government should spend amount on the educational institutions which are accessible by large population but it seems convinced that establishing cadet colleges, involving high costs, is the best way to deliver quality education.
The government could not spend a single penny on 61 projects during the first quarter (July-September 2007) out of total 104 projects to be completed this year.
The main approved projects, which remained un-noticed included Gwadar Institute of Technology, establishment of three PMUs for the provision of quality education in Balochistan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), cadet colleges in Okara, Ranjgoor and Swabi, Madarassah Reform Project, Punjab School Libraries Project and National School Nutrition Programme, he added.
Comments
Comments are closed.