RAWALPINDI: The Rawalpindi Municipal Corporation’s (RMC) first budget session will be held on Thursday, to approve the annual budget of Rs1.6 billion for January to June 2017.

The opposition and treasury benches have devised their strategies for the session, with the opposition aiming to give the treasury benches a tough time despite their small numbers.

The opposition, made up of the PPP, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and Awami Muslim League (AML), have begun efforts to jointly criticise the government for running the city’s affairs with the bureaucracy.

First session to approve Rs1.6bn annual budget to be held tomorrow

A senior RMC official told Dawn that the provincial government has issued the civic body’s business rules and asked the elected house to approve the budget.

The province’s local government was formed on Jan 1, but the budget was not approved because the provincial government’s elected members failed to finalise the rules of business for the local governments.

It took over two months to finalise the rules, and the budget session was called soon after to approve the annual budget for six months.

“Mayor Sardar Naseem will chair the meeting, while all the union council chairmen and members elected to reserved seats will approve the budget,” the official said.

He said the Rs1.6 billion budget has been prepared, adding: “Rs250 million have been allocated for development schemes and will be spent on the recommendations of the union council chairmen.”

“The RMC elected house will also approve the purchase of two buses to transport dead bodies from houses to graveyards, two trucks for loading goods seized during anti-encroachment drives, two vehicles to replace and fix streetlights and one vehicle each for road construction work and debris removal,” he said.

Although the Pirwadhai bus stand has its property have not been handed over to the RMC, the corporation has included the expected income from the rent of over 100 shops, hotels and petrol filling stations, as well as parking fees, in the budget.

The official said development funds will not be spent on the recommendations of the union councils, because the mayor will allot the funds to them as per his discretionary powers.

Former city nazim Sheikh Rashid Shafique, the elected chairman of the Sarafa Bazaar union council and nephew of AML President Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, told Dawn that the government should have to explain the role of the commissioner in the present setup.

“The Rawalpindi commissioner is running the affairs of the civic bodies, while the Rawalpindi mayor is a dummy representative. All the decisions are being made by the commissioner, from the cleanliness of the drains to the transfer and posting of senior officers, and the mayor is present to endorse the acts of the bureaucracy,” he said.

Mr Shafique said the opposition will seek details of government spending over the last year and a half from the district administration and commissioner, adding that it was strange that the commission had no role in development issues but was approving development projects for union councils.

Published in Dawn, March 1st, 2017