Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Pervez Khattak has directed the formation of different committees for the restructuring of Tourism Corporation Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (TCKP) to review the audit, accounts and spending of the corporation. The committees would present reports in the next meeting.
He issued these directives while presiding over 21st meeting of the Board of Directors of TCKP. The board formed different committees to streamline the working and budgeting of the corporation and putting the corporation to work on professional lines. It also reviewed different projects for onward presentation and marketing in the Beijing road-show towards the end of March.
Provincial Minister Mehmood Khan, Special Assistant to CM Abdul Munim, Chief Secretary, Abid Saeed, administrative secretaries, members of Board of Directors of the tourism corporation and others attended the meeting.
The meeting had a threadbare discussion on the working of the corporation, different packages for the promotional activities including traditional and non-traditional sports, exhibitions for the rich heritage of the province and decided to further expand the promotional activities of the corporation on professional lines.
Pervez Khattak said Tourism has all the potentials to become the mainstay of the provincial economy and the government was working on these lines. He revealed the government was about to announce different autonomous authorities for different areas in order to develop these areas on tourism lines. The authorities would plan their own areas and develop different pockets on tourism lines. The authorities would generate their own resources and plan the development of their own areas. The sites developed by the government would be out sourced to private sector.
Chief Minister was very much particular about the capacity of the staff of the corporation and asked the committees to check the recruitment mechanism and the educational background and check experience documents etc. He agreed to the proposal to give advisory role to the members falling with the conflict of interest law. The committees formed for different activities would submit their recommendations within a fortnight. The Chief Minister also directed to out-source different tourist spots and sites to the private sectors for development on tourism lines. He also directed to plan how much projects of tourism should go to the Beijing Road-show. The Chief Minister directed to work out a detail sketch of the promotional activities of different regions having rich cultural heritage in order to attract domestic and foreign tourists.
He directed to find out a mechanism liaising with the educational institutions to conduct different activities for those students who would study in the same subjects in future. Beyond this would be the wastage of resources, he added. He also directed to have a focus approach planning activities for the whole of the year. Tourism festivity and sports are the thrilling and attractive activities therefore the corporation should have a system linking all the regions of the province and registering all the sports and cultural organisations so that a compact picture emerges and the corporation on the basis of it could plan activities for the future. He directed against the concentration of activities in one area adding that all areas should have proper participation and the share of each area should be protected.
He reminded, it was during his recent visit to China that he interacted with the people out there who were keen in the Budha, traits the history and other historical and culturally rich traditions and centres which this province had because it was the centre of different civilisations in the past adding that such places and sub cultures needed to be showcased and tourists thus attracted.
He regretted the corporation was short of skilled manpower in the field. He further regretted that the government officials spend a lot of resources on their visits and trainings abroad and at the end of the day their knowledge and institutional memories were not transferred to the department therefore adding that it was the wastage of resources having no benefit to the province.
The corporation he added should pick different known sites, sports and other culturally rich traditions and market them in order to attract domestic and foreign tourists. Jeep rallies, Shandur festival, the culture of Kalash and other regions of the province should be properly packaged and separate projects should be made and the government would arrange financial support.
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