Khyber Pakhtunkhwa senior minister for local government and rural development Inayatullah has revealed that as many as 4,000 community-based developmental projects worth Rs 2.6 billion have been approved and physical work started on the same under community local development programme in six districts of Malakand Division.
He was presiding over a meeting to review the progress of European Union funded CDLD programme at Peshawar on Thursday. The meeting was attended by Secretary Local government and rural development Syed Jamal-ud-din shah, team leader CDLD Brain Fawcett, coordinator Said Rehman, director general local government and other concerned officers.
The senior minister expressed satisfaction over the progress made so far, and termed it as a unique programme of the government not only because it provides opportunities to the poor communities in the target areas to identify, plan and implement their village development priorities by using their local wisdom and resources but more importantly the ownership and lead it has received from the provincial and district administration, making it a best of " Community model" with engagement of communities, Non-Government Organization(NGO) and government working together to contribute to the policy objectives.
He informed that because of its success, the provincial government, in agreement with the European Union, has extended the programme to six more districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and days are not far off when it will be extended to all the districts of the province in a phased manner. Provincial government is receiving repeated requests from other districts for inclusion in the ambit of this unique programme.
He informed the meeting that during a short span of time, the programme has created many success stories on the ground where it has received 23,000 applications from needy communities, out of which the programme team has established 4000 community based organizations (CBO's), having cumulative beneficiaries of 3 million. Under the CDLD programme, 4000 community projects worth 5 billion rupees approved and Rs 2.6 billion disbursed to the Communities though district administration and CBO's in programme districts. This is encouraging that programme has included more than 612 woman beneficiaries. This number of beneficiaries is increasing with each passing day.
He noted that importantly, the programme has been officially allowed for alignment with the elected local governments in terms of joint planning, which will ensure more meaningful interactions between the communities and local governments. This alignment will also ensure better synergies with ongoing technical assistance programmes being working in the districts to create enabling capacities at the district and sub district level for improved governance.
He thanked Chief Minister for approval of the CDLD extension. It is important to note that appreciating the successes of the programme, in phase-I the Chief Minister KP, during the stock take in January 2017, had emphasized the need for piloting the programme to generate livelihood opportunities in the target districts, through soliciting and implementing small scale innovative ideas and proposals.
The Senior Minister local government appreciated that the role of the secretary local government and coordinator CDLD and told that the success of the phase-I of the programme can rightly be attributed to the team work, especially the lead and ownership provided by the provincial government district administration, Social Mobilization Partner and above all the communities taking lead on their development agenda.
The Senior Minister local government gave proposals for addressing the project employee's issues in the extension phase consideration, monitoring, and oversight role for the district Nazimeen and brining more visibility and popularity for this important programme.
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