Rs10bn package, jobs proposed for Balochistan: Checkposts in cities to be abolished
ISLAMABAD, Jun 23: A sub-committee of the Parliamentary Committee on Balochistan on Thursday released its recommendations which also envisage a Rs10 billion development package for the province.
Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed, who heads the drafting committee, told a press conference that the parliamentary committee had unanimously adopted the recommendations.
The members of the sub-committee – three each from the government and the opposition – held 11 meetings and visited Quetta, Gwadar and Dera Bugti many a time before finalizing the recommendations.
The package includes Rs1 billion for hospitals for providing life-saving drugs and anti-venom vaccine, Rs2 billion for Sui, Rs3 billion for Gwadar and Rs4 billion for development of Quetta.
The implementation of the development package would rest with a three-member committee comprising Senator Mushahid, principal secretary to the prime minister Javed Sadiq Malik and chairman prime minister’s inspection commission Maj-Gen Farooq Ahmed.
Mr Mushahid said that the 5.4 per cent of Balochistan’s quota in the federal government jobs, agreed to after 1998 census, would be implemented and added that ads for these jobs would be advertised in local papers of the province within 90 days.
In the job quota, he explained, people of Gwadar would be at the top of priority followed by Makran and then the rest of Balochistan.
He said fishermen disturbed because of the construction of the Gwadar port would be relocated and given compensation.
The sub-committee, he said, had agreed that gas and petroleum royalty should be paid to the areas from where they were extracted.
He said that people of Balochistan would be given representation on the board of directors of the Oil and Gas Development Company and the Sui Southern Gas Company. The oil and gas companies working in the province would be bound to implement their agreements of development projects for local residents, he added.
Another recommendation of the sub-committee is to provide a one-time waiver on gas charges in local areas of the province.
The chief justice of the Balochistan High Court, he said, would be asked to investigate the alleged irregularities in the sale of land in Gwadar.
The role of the Coast Guards and Frontier Constabulary would be restricted to check smuggling of drugs and other goods along the border areas and all their checkposts from towns and cities would be abolished.
To control the effect of drought in the province, the sub-committee recommended short-term and long-term strategies, including waiver of government dues and construction of dams.
Senator Mushahid said that night landing facilities at the Quetta airport would be provided immediately.
Referring to the approval of the recommendations by the parliament committee, he said it was a ‘historic day’.
The chairman of the constitutional sub-committee, Wasim Sajjad, said the recommendations would be presented before the house within the next few days for approval. He said since these were constitutional recommendations they would require two-thirds majority of the Senate and National Assembly to get through.—APP
Our Staff Reporter adds: Three nationalist parties’ representatives — Balochistan National Party’s Rauf Mengal, MNA; Senator Aslam Buledi of National Party and Senator Amanullah Kanrani of the Jamhoori Watan Party — as well as PPP-Parliamentarians’ Makhdoom Amin Fahim and Senator Raza Rabbani continued their boycott of the parliamentary committee’s meetings for varying reasons.
In a statement, the leader of opposition in the Senate Raza Rabbani said: “No useful purpose would have been served by the party’s participation in today’s meeting since the official PML had recently stated that the PPP would not be included in any discussion on provincial autonomy and other issues relating to Balochistan”.
Mr Mengal said they had boycotted the committee because they believed it was incompetent to address the provincial autonomy issue which, he added, was the core issue in the Balochistan situation.
Talking to Dawn, he said the committee’s meeting today (Thursday) had vindicated their apprehensions about its incompetence as it had reiterated the Mushahid’s report which was already made public and which offered only ‘cosmetic resolutions’ of the problem.
The committee stressed an early settlement of the resources to be given to the province through the sixth NFC award by taking into consideration the level of development, degree of backwardness and other factors.
ISLAMABAD, Jun 23: A sub-committee of the Parliamentary Committee on Balochistan on Thursday released its recommendations which also envisage a Rs10 billion development package for the province.
