KARACHI: 50 CCBs set up in Karachi to date
KARACHI: The district nazim is the boss of the district police officer and writes the officerÂ’s ACR (Annual Confidential Report) under the police order. However, like other sections of the Local Government Ordinance pertaining to devolution of power, its implementation is being resisted by traditional power wielders.
This was said by Muhammad Naeemul Haq, Member Prime Minister’s Secretariat, National Reconstruction Bureau, Islamabad in reply to a question during a media workshop on “Local Government System” held here on Friday.
He also pointed out that the nazims and councillors are public servants and equally accountable as any government servant. As such the nazims are under obligation to keep the accounts committee informed about their monthly expenditures.
He lauded the media’s role in creating awareness among the masses and playing an important role in compelling the provincial governments and authorities to enforce the LG system to make devolution a success, he said
Communication for Effective social Service Delivery (CESSD), a Canadian International Development Agency, and NRB project has jointly taken the initiative to involve the media effectively to communicate with larger sections of society to raise awareness among all sections of society to strengthen the principle and process of devolution of power and also strengthen the role of local communities, especially the poor and marginalised groups to have their say in local level needs, the identification, priority setting and budget allocation.
He said it was observed that even after completion of the first tenure of local governments there was confusion and lack of clarity about the roles and responsibilities of local governments, especially elected representatives with respect to local level development planning, priority setting and allocation of funds for development activities.
He said there were over 30,000 Citizens Community Board in all four provinces by September 2006, of which 3,902 were in Sindh. Sadly, in Karachi district there were only 50 CCBs! He said in three districts of NWFP Abbottbad, Nowshera and Peshawar were more than 800 CCBs and all of them had exhausted their development budget and demanding more allocation
He said the funds allocated to the districts for development could not lapse with the end of the fiscal year but continue to accumulate and whenever the CCBs were formed, the funds could be utilised. He said under the CCB, 20 per cent funds of the project had to be raised locally by the community while the rest of the budget would be provided by the federal and provincial governments.
He said in all four provinces, there were 394 town and tehsil councils, 6,125 union, 110 district councils and the total strength of councillors and nazims was more than 85,000.
To yet another question, he said that the ordinance was ready for promulgation for holding local government elections in the cantonments and Islamabad but the date was yet to be decided by the government about its enforcement.
Concluding the workshop, Advisor Dr Tariq Niazi said the biggest problem in implementation of the devolution system was lack of knowledge as the elected representatives and the officers concerned were still unaware of the powers they could exercise to ensure public service to the people.
He said the elite, who had been ruling for 150 years were reluctant and resisting giving up their powers to the elected representatives.
Source: Dawn
Date:3/31/2007
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