KHAR: The local leaders of political parties and trade unions in Bajaur Agency have shown dissatisfaction over the performance of non-governmental organisations working in the region.

They urged the administration to evolve appropriate monitoring system to make the activities of NGOs fruitful.

They made the complaint during a meeting, held here the other day at the office of additional political agent, with the representatives of various NGOs. Additional Political Agent Mohammad Irfanuddin chaired the meeting.

Addressing the meeting, Bajaur Political Parties Alliance president Haji Rahat Yousaf, JI emir Qari Abdul Majeed Yazdani, PML-Q president Haji Saib Badshah, Shahbuddin Khan of PPP, Gul Afzal Khan of ANP and Bajaur Traders Association president Mohammad Saleem Khan alleged that performance of NGOs was poor as their activities were limited only to paper work.

They said that the NGOs were bound to launch community-based schemes but majority of them didn’t follow rules and regulations. They gave priority to influential people instead of deserving people, they added.

Political leaders urge administration to evolve monitoring system

“We have solid proofs that representatives of most NGOs are not interested to benefit poor and deserving people,” said Haji Rahat.

They claimed that huge amount was provided to the NGOs for launching different public welfare schemes in the agency but mismanagement and corruption affected their performance owing to lack of proper monitoring system. They said that senior officials of political administration and security forces should take notice of the poor performance of the NGOs.

They also called for strict action against the representatives of NGOs, who were involved in corruption and mismanagement in the projects. They also criticised the NGOs for not hiring local people for execution of their projects.

On the occasion, the representatives of NGOs briefed the meeting about their projects and said that they were working to improve life standard of the people by providing them different facilities.

They said that they had close contact with local community. They said that they were not bound to take political leaders and traders into confidence before launching schemes because they were accountable to community and local administration only.

Speaking on the occasion, the additional political agent said that the administration would form a monitoring committee to check activities of NGOs. He also showed concern over slow pace of work on various schemes in different parts of agency.

Published in Dawn, April 23rd, 2015

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