KOHAT: Participants of a seminar held for guidance of the newly-elected local body members have demanded that all the administrative and other powers concerning provision of municipal services be given to the mayors and chairmen instead of the deputy commissioner and commissioner.

The two-day seminar, organised by an NGO at a local guest house here, concluded on Saturday.

Representatives of the social and political organisations were in attendance and they were briefed about the development schemes continuing since 2019.

It was reaffirmed that the projects especially of roads of Junglekhel, water supply, health, etc, would continue under the new setup for which funds would be provided by the provincial government.

The local body members were also briefed about running of the tehsil councils’ sessions according to the local government laws. They were asked to study the laws so as to fully benefit from the grassroots level programme.

POWER OUTAGES: The Pesco consumers here have been irked by increased power outages with the advent of Ramazan, especially during Iftar and Taraveeh timings due to the outdated old Rawalpindi road grid station, which burnt twice last year.

Meanwhile, for the last two months the Pesco authorities in Kohat had been disconnecting the supply for a whole day twice a week for necessary repairs in the Rawalpindi road grid station.

The officials have been saying that it is being done to ensure smooth supply during Ramazan.

However, official sources confided to this correspondent on Saturday that the Rawalpindi road grid station had gone very old and it was overloaded. They said that since its establishment the population had grown five times in the city with the expansions of highways and housing societies.

Similarly, 15 years ago the lawmakers had promised a new grid station on the same Rawalpindi road for the city and nearby areas. The sources said that billions of rupees were required for the new grid to solve the problem, but the government was delaying issuance of funds.

Published in Dawn, April 10th, 2022