NWFP Governor Lieutenant General Ali Muhammad Jan Aurakzai (retired) has stressed the need for effective, judicious and full utilisation of Fata ADP funds; and that there should be no surrender of funds at the end of current financial year. He directed that the local people and elected representatives should be involved while formulating development plans for Fata.
He was addressing the political agents and heads of Fata line departments during a meeting held at Governor's House here on Thursday on the eve of mid-year review of Fata ADP 2006-2007. Chief Secretary Sahibzada Riaz Noor, Chairman Governor's Inspection Team Sahibzada Muhammad Khalid, Secretary to Governor Azmat Hanif and Chief Executive Fata Development Authority Muhammad Shahzad Arbab also attended the meeting.
During a presentation given by the Additional Secretary Planning and Development Kazaim Niaz, it was revealed that Rs 3316 million out of the total outlay of Rs 6200 million had been released up to the end of second quarter of the current financial year with 60 percent utilisation so far. On sector-wise basis, the maximum fund utilisation was 89.2 percent and 88 percent in power and forest sectors respectively, whereas Kohat FR had utilised 100 percent funds followed by Orakzai Agency with 81 percent fund's utilisation.
The Governor directed the departments concerned to ensure 100 percent utilisation of funds by the end of third quarter of the financial year. He urged the departments to hold internal review meetings regularly and co-ordinate with the Works and Services Department both at the headquarters as well as agency levels to review the progress. On a point the Governor directed that each Agency and FR should be visited by the directors and secretaries thrice and twice a year to monitor the activities.
The governor urged the political officers to strengthen the writ of the government and come hard on the criminal elements. "The writ of govt. must be maintained at all costs so that the development work could be carried on smoothly without any hindrance", he added.
The Governor also expressed dismay over reports about absenteeism in the education and health institutions and urged the political authorities as well as respective departments to root out this practice. On the development side the Governor underlined the need for putting effective monitoring mechanism at the Agency level and asked the political agents to devise such a mechanism at local level.
He said that the Governor's Inspection Team and Monitoring Cell of Civil Secretariat Fata would simultaneously carry out on-ground monitoring of development projects. The Governor while giving his opinion on dormant schemes said that before initiating a project, it's technical, physical, political and financial feasibility must be studied.
He directed the FDA to take over all the technical and vocational institutions in Fata and make them fully functional. Regarding Utility stores, the Governor said that this facility was being extended to remaining parts of Fata for benefit of the population.
Reviewing the state of electricity in Fata the Governor expressed his concern over reports about continuous load shedding and low voltage power supply in almost every tribal Agency and FR and directed the Tesco officials, present in the meeting to improve and upgrade the system to ensure full power supply with less interruption.
He recalled that provision of natural gas to tribal area had been approved and in the first phase of the project, Kurram, Orakzai Agency, FR Kohat and FR Peshawar would be extended the facility for which the survey would initiate shortly. Similarly in the second phase the facility would be extended to remaining areas of Fata.
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