A meeting of the Council of Common Interests (CCI) will consider National Water Policy and may reconsider its decision for validation of five percent census results today (Tuesday). An official said CCI meeting scheduled for March 21 had been postponed and Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has convened the meeting with same four points agenda with likelihood of more items being brought up for discussion. The meeting, which will be presided over by the prime minister and attended by chief ministers, will be given an update by Ministry of Statistics on Monitoring and Oversight Committee of Senators for five percent validation exercise of census results.
An official said there are remote chances for audit of 5 percent census results because there has been hardly any progress on the matter after December 2017 and moreover as the general elections are almost around the corner, focus is now more on election then the audit of census.
Secretary Ministry of Statistics Rukhsana Yaseem also stated during a meeting of parliamentary committee that there are some serious issues in carrying out validation exercise with major one is the time factor. She added that validation of any census can be done within a couple of months after the exercise. She said the exercise could not be taken up primarily Senator Taj Haider wanted the audit to the conducted on the parameters of seven points provided by him rather than those decided by the CCI. Thus, the validation exercise could not move ahead.
An official stated that general elections can be held on the basis of provisional results and provisional results were provided to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) a few months ago. The official did not rule out possibility the CCI may reconsider its earlier decision of validation of five percent results of census.
Ministry of Water and Power has forwarded National Water Policy for consideration and approval of CCI while Ministry of Statistics will submit report on audit of 5 percent census results.
Finance Division has also moved decisions of the meeting of Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet to the meeting for the CCI ratification. Ministry of Federal education and Professional Training has moved an agenda item for presentation by Pakistan Alliance for Mathematics and Science.
Sources in the Inter-Provincial Ministry said there is a possibility that meeting may discuss early setting up of 300MW coal-fired power plant in Gwadar and the HEC related matter as well. Dostain Khan Jamaldini, head of Gwadar Port Authority stated recently before a parliamentary committee on planning and development that a coal-fired power plant will soon be established by a Chinese company at Gwadar. Presently a 7.8MW captive power plant is installed to provide electricity to the free zone, he added.
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