Administrative secretaries urged to focus on public service

Chief Secretary NWFP Javed Iqbal has urged all the administrative secretaries of the provincial government to focus on public service delivery, terming it the main ingredient of good governance in any public sector organisation. This he said while chairing a meeting of the Secretaries Committee in Civil Secretariat Peshawar, on Friday. The meeting besides other matters discussed the budget strategy paper for the next financial year.
The meeting was given a detailed presentation by the Secretary Establishment on project employees, focusing on their terms and conditions and other related aspects. An important item of the meeting agenda, was punctuality in government offices so as to improve the efficiency of the departments and public service delivery.
After detailed discussions, the Chief Secretary stressed upon all the administrative secretaries to ensure timely attendance, for which a system of monitoring should be devised by each department. It carried out review of the provincial government own receipts of the current year up to 31st December 2009.
Talking about provincial receipts, the Chief Secretary said that before setting targets for provincial receipts, generation capacity of each department should be ascertained and realistic targets on concrete basis should be evolved. The meeting also discussed the problems faced by the departments in clearing electricity dues and non-reconciliation of the expenditures and receipts by certain departments.
The matter regarding payment of honoraria to the employees was also discussed in detail and it was directed that it should be performance based. The Chief Secretary also directed the departments to immediately prepare inventories of all their assets, both moveable and immovable. For this purpose, database should be prepared and supplied to the Finance Department, he added.
The matter regarding holding of two posts at senior level by certain officers, was also discussed in the meeting and the Chief Secretary felt that this was not in line with good governance as it was not possible for one officer to perform functions of two different organisations simultaneously. The matter is therefore under scrutiny and a decision to this effect would soon be taken in public interest.
It was decided that meetings of the Secretaries Committee would be held on regular basis so that matters/issues of public importance are discussed and scrutinised before submitting the same to the provincial cabinet or the chief executive, for final decision.
Commenting on the presentation made by Secretary Finance on the budget strategy paper, the Chief Secretary hoped that because of the net hydel profits and favourable NFC award, reasonable fiscal space would be available in the days to come, which will make the provincial government self-reliant to a greater extent.
He also mentioned about the approval of Chashma Right Bank Canal Ist Lift scheme by Ecnec, which will help irrigate 300 thousand acres of additional agricultural land in District D.I.Khan. Similarly, other mega projects like Tank Zam, Gomal Zam and Munda Projects would boost agriculture of the province on completion, he maintained.
The Chief Secretary informed that a meeting to finalise a Comprehensive Development Strategy (CDS) for the province would be held next week with all the stakeholders. The meeting was attended by all the administrative secretaries of the provincial government.