BHURBAN, June 29: Pakistan is not the only country in the world that is facing problems in transfer of financial and administrative powers to the grass-roots level but countries like Poland, Bangladesh, Indonesia, South Africa and India are also facing similar problems.

This was the consensus opinion of the speakers on the second day of a three-day forum on “International Relations and Improved Service Delivery in Pakistan” being held here.

Speaking on the occasion, Chairman Commonwealth Grants Commission, Australia, Alan Morris said Pakistan was not the only country that was facing problems in distribution of funds in the local government system. He said in many countries where devolution system had been introduced recently were facing similar problems.

In Australia, he said the taxes levied by the federal, provincial and district governments were separate and the governments were fully empowered to raise their respective taxes. He said 45 per of the total revenue collected by the federal government was transferred to the local governments for various schemes.

Mr Morris said a body had been formed in every state in Australia where people could lodged their complaints against the mayor. He said even in Australia the central politicians preferred to rule the local bodies instead of sitting with the local body members.

George Mathews from the Institute of Social Sciences, India, highlighted the problems in union and Panchayat system in India saying that lack of awareness, accountability, decision-making, influence of elite in villages, lack of political will, unframed rules, resistance by the traditional village setup and the political groups were the main problems being faced in devolution of power.

He said a district planning committee had been formed in each district in India to supervise the Panchayats, and each state had a financial commission to ensure financial resources of these Panchayats.

Representing his country, Mr Kadjatmiko said though the devolution system had brought visible changes in Indonesia, still a lot of work had to be done to remove all flaws and bottlenecks in the new system. He said the powers and affairs of the federal and the local governments had been designated.

The federal government, he said, dealt with matters related to foreign affairs, defence, security, justice, fiscal and religious affairs, while the local governments handled issues of public welfare, health, education, culture, agriculture, transport, trade, industry, environment, land, cooperative and labour.

Talking about distribution of funds, he said the federal government provided 90 per cent of development funds to the local governments and 10 per cent to the provinces. He said lack of coordination between the central and local agencies, ineffective decentralisation process and ignoring of provincial governments by the local setups were the main problems facing the Indonesian government.

Jerzy Regulski from Poland said under the devolution plan all municipalities in his country had their own budgets to break the monopoly of the state budget.

Ismail Momoniat and Kamal Uddin Siddique, who were representing South Africa and Bangladesh respectively, also briefed the participants of the forum on various problems confronting their countries in implementation of the local government financial system.