HARIPUR May 28: The Chairman of the National Reconstruction Bureau, Danial Aziz, said on Thursday that poverty alleviation and check on embezzlement of funds in state-sponsored development schemes could be ensured only through formation of Community Citizen Boards (CCB) at union council level.

This he said while speaking to a gathering of councillors, nazim, naib nazims of different UCs of Haripur and NGO workers at TIP officer Club ground. MNA Zaib Goher Ayub, MNA Omar Ayub, district nazim Dr Raja Amer Zaman were also present on the occasion. The function was arranged by the Devolution Trust for Community Empowerment DTCE.

Mr Aziz said that CCBs were the mandatory part of local government system which had been given constitutional cover by the present government recently. Talking about the nomenclature of CCBs, he said that these boards would execute village and Mohalla level development projects with 20pc cash contribution from community side and 80 per cent expenditures of a project would be borne by the union administration.

He said that rampant corruption in state-funded schemes had not only discouraged foreign donors but also worsened the standard of construction of such schemes, endangering scores of lives.

Referring to government expenses on development projects, Mr Danial said that the government had spent Rs280 billion on public sector development projects during the last five years but in spite of the fact this allocation was higher than those of India and Bangladesh, Pakistan had remained far behind these countries in terms of civic amenities, and the root cause was the same decades old culture of corruption and looting by local government representatives and parliamentarians, he added.

He urged the people to feel sense of responsibility so that the goal of poverty reduction, real development, real democracy, devolution of power to grass-roots level could be achieved.

He said that since the CCBs were the very much part of LB system, union nazims should not discourage them considering them as to their parallel entities.

About abolition of condition of 20pc cash contribution from the people in the schemes, he said that cash contribution by the public created a sense of responsibility and ownership among the people narrowing the chances of embezzlement. However, he promised to discuss the pros and cons of the idea at central level.

He also assured union administrations of financial support up to Rs2 million from the DTCE and government once the CCBs were established and started working to the optimal level.

Speaking on this occasion finance parliamentary secretary MNA Omar Ayub said that federal government was committed to poverty reduction and improvement of living standard of the people.

District Nazim Dr Raja Amer Zaman in his address suggested that due to abject poverty in various union councils of Haripur, contribution of 20pc cash in CCB projects was not feasible and, therefore, the government should abolish the condition allowing communities of such UCs to contribute in kind rather than cash.