May 23, 2008	Friday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 17, 1429

ISLAMABAD, May 22: Senate Standing Committee on Planning and Development has expressed its dissatisfaction over the pace of execution of the various ongoing development schemes and projects and directed that every effort must be made to implement these within the stipulated time without any compromise on quality.

The committee met at the Parliament House on Thursday under the chairmanship of Senator Saeed Ahmed Hashmi.

The Senate body assured its support in overcoming the bottlenecks and difficulties being faced by the ministries and divisions concerned in this regard.

It also recommended that the existing differences over planning and execution of some of the development projects among the federating units be resolved through the Council of Common Interest (CCI).

“Projects were delayed either due to lack of funding or lack of management skills in a majority of cases and we must make sure that this should not continue to plague our development planning,” it added.

The committee also urged the government to accord a high priority to the energy and power generation sector as development could not take place without these vital ingredients therefore, this sector must be accorded priority it deserves. It especially pointed out that the share of nuclear and coal-based power should be increased in our energy mix.

Similarly, it recommended that the country’s hydel potential should be utilised in its full capacity. In this connection, focus must be on ‘run of the river potential’ which according to some members of the committee, stood as high as 32,000MW.

The committee observed that emphasis be placed on utilising the mineral capacity of Balochistan which at present was largely unexplored.

The committee demanded allied facilities for Gwadar Port area on priority basis in order to operationalise it in full capacity.

“At present it is without power and water supply of its own.”

The committee also observed that the federal government must ensure that all colleges had well-equipped science and computer laboratories and efforts be made to provide missing facilities to the existing schools and colleges.

Some members of the committee held the view that present focus on higher education was somewhat misplaced as most of the schools and colleges in the country which were supposed to be the nursery for these universities, lacked basic facilities.

“Present allocations for the education sector (excluding HEC) reflect a downward trend which is very alarming.”

Investment in education is investment in our future, they maintained.

The committee also took exception to the fact that the contracts of a number of members of the Planning Commission had not been renewed on time and this impacted very adversely the performance of the commission especially at a time when the national budget is only a few weeks away.

Earlier, the Planning Commission made a presentation on review of PSDP 2007-08 and physical and financial targets achieved till March 31, 2008.

The committee’s chairman, Senator Saeed Ahmed Hashmi, asked the Planning Commission to expedite progress on Greater Quetta Water Supply Scheme with revised PC-I.

The meeting was attended, among others, by senators Anisa Zeb Tahirkheli, Lt-Gen (retired) Javed Ashraf, Kalsoom Parveen, Gulshan Saeed, Dr Kausar Firdaus, Hafiz Rashid Ahmed and Abdur Rahim Khan Mandokhel besides the deputy chairman, Planning Commission and other senior officials.—Online