PESHAWAR: Mismanagement and defective infrastructure construction under the foreign-funded Rs1.4 billion Kala Dhaka Area Development Project have been reported by the Planning and Monitoring Unit of the Narcotics Control Division, Islamabad.

Besides, the division’s latest monitoring and evaluation report has also pointed out financial mismanagement and delays caused by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa authorities in the project implementation, according to a copy of the document available with Dawn.

“The project is a classic example of flawed management practices, causing precious public money going down the drain,” said an official on the condition of anonymity.

One glaring example of the faulty management mentioned in the report is about the location of the project management office (PMO). The office was set up at a place from where it took the project managers a six hours drive to access the project area, causing on-the-site day-to-day management ineffective.

“The location of the project office away from the project (area) is leading to governance issues,” contains the Narcotics Control Division’s report that pinpoints the problems/shortcomings and recommends remedial measures to make effective use of the foreign-funded projects.

After its planning and paperwork launched on January 1, 2006 the Kala Dhaka Area Development Project had been conceived with multiple objectives of eradicating poppy cultivation and undertaking socio-economic development in the project area.

However, it has not been free of bureaucratic red tape as physical work on the project commenced much later after the plan was granted approval by the Economic Committee of the National Economic Council in May 2011.

Of the Rs1.4 billion estimated project cost, over Rs980 million has been committed by the international narcotics and law enforcement, USA, and Rs356 million by the federal government. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government would pool in Rs69.9 million and its special development unit at the planning and development department is the project executing agency.

The monitoring report points out deficiencies recorded by the narcotics division’s monitors during on-the-site inspection of the project area in the financial year 2012-13. The report, said an official, had been shared with the provincial government with recommendations for the project executing agency to rectify the situation.

The reason for setting up the PMO at Mansehra instead of Kala Dhaka (now settled Torghar district) was the decision makers’ obvious choice to avoid risks to the safety of project managers and their subordinate staff.

“Project managers and their administrative staff were not ready to be housed there so the PMO had to be stationed at Mansehra, which created ample room for causing leakages,” said the official.

The monitoring report contains quite a few examples of the public money being lost due to poor management.

Reporting one such case, the report mentions that the contractor, who was assigned to construct eight kilometre stretch of Thakot-Darban blacktop road, used “oversized base course, leading to lose compaction”. A difference of 1.5 inch was noted by the monitors, according to the report.

The executing agency (SDU at the P&D) was advised to rectify the deficiencies, but it failed to take any action till the report was compiled a few months ago.

The report mentions that construction of the 1.4km Mamana Kandow to Manjakot shingle road and the Kamal Banda Karak road via Bostani Mera Madakhel was also not according to the specification.

Similarly, delays in implementing the construction works on the 1.4km Gawandala to Charkot road via Mera Madakhel, and on the 8-12km section of the Mamana Kandow to Manjakot road have also been reported in the monitoring report.

The contract for the 1.4km section of the road was awarded in December 2012 whereas physical work on the same had not been launched even in May 2013 when the monitors visited to inspect progress on the project. The 8-12km section of the Mamana Kandow to Manjakot road, which was required to be completed in 30 months, recorded only eight per cent of the word done when the monitors visited the area.

According to officials, the deficiencies reported in the narcotics control division’s report had been brought to the notice of the SDU instantly after the evaluation was conducted last year, but no action was taken by the project execution agency to make the contractors fulfill their obligation in accordance with their contracts.

The report mentions that the provincial government’s line departments incurred expenditure (on their respective components of the project) at their own “without its verification from the project management unit, leading to inappropriate quality of work”.

Similarly, the vocational training part of the project, which was to be carried out with the financial support of the provincial government, was reported to be way behind the schedule.

About the low utilisation of funds provided by the provincial government, the report contains that the province released Rs63 million till May 2013 against which the project executing agencies spent only Rs14 million, making 22 per cent of the releases.

Pointing another problem, it reported that the executing agency was requested to finalise the location of four micro hydel power generating units by January 2013, but the same was not done till May that year.