RAWALPINDI: The local government (LG) office, which used to be the sole executing agency for different projects in the rural areas of the Rawalpindi division, has lost its key development role since 2008.

The LG office coordinated with 30 TMAs in the four districts - Attock, Rawalpindi, Chakwal and Jhelum - for identifying problems faced by the citizens and resolving them by launching development projects.

Though the three-storey building of the LG office is the biggest government-owned structure in Rawalpindi and once housed hundreds of workers, at present there are only three employees.

Even the official telephone remains non-functional for the last four months due to the non-payment of bills.

During the government of Pervez Musharraf when elected representatives were given powers at the grass-roots level, the LG office was allocated lots of funds and it reached out to the far-flung areas and launched projects for community development.

However, things dramatically changed when the district coordination officers (DCOs) were made the administrators in 2008 and the LG office funds were given under the control of the district administration.

Official sources told Dawn that most of the contractual employees of the LG office left their jobs due to non-release of salaries for months.

The major tasks that used to be performed by the LG office included supply of drinking water, construction of roads, maintenance of schools and small health units, sanitation and launching awareness campaigns.

The post of the director LG and community development is currently vacant and the additional charge has been given to another officer for coordinating with the TMAs about the anti-dengue campaigns.

“You see I cannot make a call with the phone available in my office. I use my personal mobile phone to contact the departments concerned.

A request has been sent to the Punjab government for the release of funds for the payment of the telephone bills,” Mirza Haq Nawaz, the acting director LG, told Dawn.

He said the TMAs were unable to resolve the issues faced by the people, adding his office had been trained to identify and resolve the problems.

“We used to monitor rural areas and our staff was well trained to identify and reach out to the people. But with so limited resources and shrinking staff, we cannot perform our job.”

However, the official said a summary had been sent to the Punjab government to provide funds to the office for effective service delivery to people living in far-flung areas across the four districts.