HARIPUR, July 28: Haripur District Nazim Yousaf Ayub Khan has said that President Pervez Musharraf has failed to implement his agenda of devolution of power and provincial governments have adopted an antagonistic attitude towards local governments.

Speaking at the press club here on Friday, he said “to seek interpretation of the Local Government Ordinance (LGO) in its true sense, I and some other district nazims are going to file a petition with the Peshawar High Court against the provincial government soon.

He said the president had promised to confer all the powers of devolved departments to the nazims but the provincial government were creating obstacles in the way of district governments.

Development funds were being diverted to the districts of the provincial government’s choice, he alleged.

Referring to an order of the NWFP governor of withdrawing the powers of revenue department from local governments, the nazim said the district governments was allocating funds for budget of the department but they had no power to transfer a patwari.

Under the LGO, he said, the provincial government had nothing to do with transfer and appointment of employees of grades 1 to 16 of the 12 devolved departments and it was bound to take the district government concerned into confidence before transferring an officer but the provincial government was bypassing his district government in all these maters.

In reply to a question, he said some sector investors were interested in promoting tourism in the areas bordering Islamabad, Tarbela Lake and Khanpur Dam, which would boost economic activities in Haripur.

Replying to another question, he said the proposed gravity flow scheme upstream river Dour for Abbottabad district would not affect the water rights of Haripur as the government had promised to build a small dam for conservation of floodwater besides sanctioning of 15 tubewells for the affected union councils.—BoC