December 03, 2006	Sunday	Ziqa'ad 11, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, Dec 2: The government has assigned a new task to the National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) to conceive a strategic agenda aimed at establishing “genuine democracy with sustained and durable good governance” in the country.

Informed sources told Dawn that the NRB had also been directed to help introduce and implement legal, judicial and police reforms with a view to rebuilding national confidence and morale as part of the essential national reconstruction agenda.

Interestingly, these directives have been issued when the Musharraf government has completed six years in power and faces general elections in 2007.

The sources said that another task given to NRB officials is to institutionalise the Provincial Finance Commission (NFC) award process. The government, they said, had sought financial and technical support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to carry out its new assignment.

According to the sources, the NRB has been asked to finalise an early action plan to implement its agenda related to democracy and good governance. In this regard, the NRB has submitted a “Support for Good Governance Group (phase-III) plan to the Planning and Development Division for approval.”

The plan has three immediate objectives: support to the ongoing and new devolution initiatives at the national and provincial levels; support to the consolidation of devolution initiatives at local government level; and support to institutional, organisational and societal capacity development initiatives.

The planning has been done in line with the priorities of the Ten Years Perspective Development Plan 2001-11. A major financing of about 38 per cent would come from UNDP's contribution. The government's share is about 11 per cent of the total cost of the plan and the remaining 51 per cent of the funding will be met through resource mobilisation of the NRB and with the support of the Prime Minister's Secretariat.

The NRB has conducted a number of institutional capacity-building initiatives and now intends to develop a comprehensive concept of capacity development that besides creating greater ownership, also enhances individual, organisational and societal capacities to effectively participate with clarity about rights and responsibilities in self-governance.

Concerned NRB officials claim that their new effort would result in redesigned structures and system with devolution of political powers, decentralisation of administrative authority, de-concentration of management functions, diffusion of power-authority nexus and distribution of resources at the maximum possible, across nine areas.

The nine areas are: political structure and system; government structure and system; law enforcement structure and system; public information structure and system; economic structure and system; public employment system; education structure and system; health structure and system; and population welfare structure and system.