ISLAMABAD: The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the National Assembly wondered at a meeting on Monday why toll collection at motorways was declining despite increase in toll charges and the flow of traffic.

As the National Highway Authority (NHA) accused the Frontier Works Organisation (FWO) — a commercial arm of the armed forces — of unilaterally retaining toll collection for about 12 years and sought the PAC’s help for recovery, federal auditors pointed out gross violations of accounting, bidding and financial rules not only by the FWO but the NHA as well.

Leader of Opposition in the National Assembly and Chairman of the PAC Syed Khurshid Ahmad Shah was particularly perturbed why toll collection from three major motorways had been declining for the past two years when not only the toll charges had been increased but the traffic flow had also gone up.

It was informed that the collection that stood at Rs1.82 billion in 2009-10, rose to Rs2.32bn in 2010-11 and touched Rs2.75bn in 2011-12, but it dropped to Rs2.65bn in 2012-13 and in the six months of the current year it touched only Rs643 million.

One reason for the drop as pointed out by the NHA officials was that only 8 out of 105 toll plazas on motorways were electronically maintained which remained out of order due to loadshedding of electricity.

The chairman of NHA said that toll charges were required to be doubled in three years or else it would become impossible to maintain these motorways which had outlived their designed life.

He said the NHA was facing serious problems with the FWO and the National Logistic Cell because the two organisations led by officers in uniform blocked payments of toll collection and unilaterally adjusted these collections against public sector development programme which was not only illegal but also against financial rules.

The Auditor General of Pakistan informed the committee that 54 out of 105 toll plazas were in the control of the FWO and the NLC, and the FWO had not honoured disbursement commitments while the NHA had failed to implement a decision of a Senate committee to retrieve these plazas from the two organisations (FWO and NLC) and give their control to new contractors through bidding.

He said on the directives of the former chairman of the PAC, the FWO was required to clear toll collection payments to the NHA while the NHA was to clear dues of FWO on account of development projects but this did not happen during the past two years.

Under the rules, he said, the funds collected for operation and maintenance (toll charges) could not be withheld or utilised anywhere else and both the organisations were in violation of rules and discipline.

He said the NHA had failed to hold bidding for collection of toll plazas and the FWO had failed to honour its commitment of paying Rs270m to NHA every month to clear the backlog.

He said the NHA was also not properly recovering its revenue through the use of its right of way on motorways and highways that it had given to private parties for commercial purposes.

The AGP pointed out that auditors had conducted a countrywide study of assets and commercial activities on motorways and provided it to the NHA for proper billing but the NHA had failed to comply with it.

He said it was strange that other organisations were increasing their revenue. The Civil Aviation Authority, according to him, had registered an increase of 13 to 15 per cent in its revenues by using its lands for commercial activities.

But, he added, the NHA was not only going in the negative on toll collection, but also on other commercial activities.

The NHA chairman said the 16-year designed life of the largest Lahore-Islamabad Motorway had expired and it had become a serious concern how to ensure its safety and maintenance.

He hinted that the motorway might have to be given to the private sector on build-operate and transfer basis because the NHA did not have financial resources to refurbish the mega asset.

Officers of the NHA and the ministry of communications made repeated attempts to get a stricture from the PAC for the recovery of Rs7.9bn from the FWO but parliamentarians called the FWO officials to the next meeting before taking the extreme step.