July 05, 2007	Thursday	Jamadi-us-Sani 19, 1428

PESHAWAR, July 4: Policymakers of the apparently cash-strapped NWFP government have flown to the United Arab Emirates for a workshop to make recommendations for a social insurance scheme for public sector employees working in the province.

High-ranking officials of the provincial government would attend the GTZ-sponsored workshop in Dubai, which was initially proposed to be held in Peshawar, sources said. The workshop will work out strategies for introducing a social insurance scheme for provincial government employees and human resource management of the health department.

“It’s probably for the first time that a workshop aiming to discuss issues of the NWFP is taking place in Dubai. It should have been held in Peshawar,” said an official of the health secretariat. In Peshawar, scores of health professionals associated with social insurance scheme and human resource management of the health department could have participated in it, he said.

The NWFP establishment department has issued no-objection certificates to at least 10 people who have flown to Dubai and will stay there from July 2 to July 7.

“The GTZ has sponsored the event from the amount the German government has allocated for supporting health sector reforms in the NWFP,” said an official. He said the GTZ was willing to hold the event in Peshawar, but officials insisted to organise it in Dubai.

The GTZ is extending financial assistance of 10 million euros to the NWFP for its reform programmes in health and education sectors. An amount of 3.4 million euros will be spent on the ongoing reform programme in the health sector.

The German government pledges 0.7 per cent of its GDP every year to developing countries for improvement of health, education and other sectors.

“Spending of the GTZ grant in such a way is waste of money,” said a source.

According to him, the delegation to attend the workshop includes the additional chief secretary, secretaries for finance and health, chief and deputy chief of the health sector reforms unit (HSRU), coordinators of the Social Insurance Scheme and Human Resource Management of the health department, health minister and his press assistant and officials of the GTZ.

Justifying the holding of the seminar in Dubai, these officials had argued that there would be disturbance if the event was organised in Peshawar, said sources. The officials had said that in case the event was held in Peshawar, participants would also be attending other important meetings and would remain engage in other matters.

“A few months back, a health official was sent to Germany to attend a seminar. The health department received a fax that the official had been missing from the seminar for the initial five days,” said a source. He added that many managerial staff of the health department and political leaders in the province had visited Switzerland, USA, UK, Canada, German, South Africa for health-related events organised for health professionals.

An official of the HSRU told Dawn that the seminar would discuss the social insurance scheme. He said there was a plan to introduce the insurance scheme in one district on pilot basis, but the government was insisting that the scheme should be launched across the province.