HARIPUR, July 16: Omar Ayub Khan, MNA, has said that Community Citizen Boards (CCB) would play a significant role in ensuring devolution of power to the grass-root level through active participation of community members in designing and supervising development schemes of their areas.

He was speaking at the concluding ceremony of the Community Citizen Boards sports festival arranged by union council Rehana at village Chapra, some 8km from here on Friday.

Omar Ayub Khan said that over 100 CCBs had so far been formed in different union councils of Haripur while efforts were under way to set up many more in the district with the help of local NGOs and union council administrations.

He said that the dream of real empowerment of communities could only come true once the communities realized the importance of Community Citizen Boards and their powers.

He urged people to form CCBs so that their participation and monitoring of development process right from decision-making to execution could be ensured.

Mr Khan, who also heads an NGO, Hadaf, said the government was contemplating making amendment to the Local Government Ordinance to enhance the existing 25 per cent mandatory allocation for CCB-specific schemes from development budgets of all the three tiers of the local government system.

Talking about schemes he had got approved for his constituency during the last fiscal year, he said Sui gas projects worth Rs320 million were underway in Khanpur and Ghazi while Rs120 million had been spent on the electrification of different areas in Haripur.

He claimed that by the end of this fiscal year, not a single village would be left without electricity. He said that a 950-line telephonic exchange had been approved for Sera-i-Saleh while new exchanges at Kazi Maira and Dingi would soon be got approved.

M Riaz Khan, nazim union council Rehana, also addressed the gathering. Dr Ali Asghar Shah of Devolution Trust for Community Empowerment, Sajid Mehmood of Hadaf, a non-government organization, and officials of community development department were also present on the occasion.