PESHAWAR, Dec 4: The NWFP Minister for Local Government and Rural Development, Sardar Mohammad Idrees, said on Monday that the NWFP government was giving top priority to improvement of the communication sector in the province, especially the road network, as it played a key role in the socio-economic development of any place.

He was speaking at the inauguration ceremony of a water supply scheme in Jalyari village of Abbottabad. The scheme was completed under the Barani Area Development Project at a cost of Rs500,000, and it would provide drinking water to the local population.

The minister said that water supply and repair and widening of roads in Galyat areas of PF-48, Abbottabad, would get top priority in government’s development plans.

The minister said the government had allocated Rs27 million for the completion and reconstruction of all male and female high schools in the area and Rs9 million had been sanctioned for the Beran Gali Road.

He said the Galyat Development Authority had recently launched development schemes of roads and water supply in the area at a cost of Rs150 million and latest machinery was being placed in all Galyat areas to remove snow from roads to ensure the smooth flow of traffic to and from remote hilly areas.

He said a three-kilometre-wide portion of a road in the Jaffar village had been metalled while work on the Berangali-Achrela-Barigali road and a number of other roads would soon be started. The minister held out the assurance that all basic problems of Galyat area would be resolved in a gradual manner.—APP