Poor performance: CDA told to cut staff at lodges

NA House and Library Committee says most of the budget diverted to salaries

ISLAMABAD:

A parliamentary panel has expressed dissatisfaction over the poor performance of staff and construction work at parliament lodges and asked the capital’s civic agency to withdraw its ‘unnecessary’ staff deputed at the complex to curtail expenses.

“The move will help reduce administrative expenditures as a major chunk of the budgetary allocation for the lodges is being spent on pay and allowances of the staff deputed at the building,” the parliamentarians observed.

Deputy Speaker Murtaza Javed Abbasi, who presided over the National Assembly House and Library Committee meeting at the Parliament Lodges on Wednesday, expressed his displeasure over the poor performance of the staff.

“The CDA staff deputed at the Parliament lodges often remain absent from their duties,” he said directing CDA to install biometric system at the lodges to ensure attendance of the staff.

Few days ago a parliamentary panel was told by the Capital Development Authority (CDA) that currently some 303 employees including senior officials are deputed at the lodges for its upkeep.

Nineteen of the staffers have been deputed at the lodges for over 25 years, without being rotated elsewhere during their whole service.

There are 133 other officials deputed at the complex for over 10 years and have never been transferred anywhere.

Recently the government informed Senate that during last two years Rs181.3 million had been spent on the Parliament Lodges under the head of civil, electrical and mechanical works. Another Rs69.5 million were spent in 2014, while Rs 111.8 in 2015.

It does not include the pay and allowance of a brigade of employees deputed at the building.

Parliament Lodges consists of nine residential blocks, seven in the use of the parliamentarians and two administration blocks. It has a total of 358 family suites. Each legislator availing the facility pays just Rs4,000 a month for a suite.

Referring to the underconstruction additional family suites and servant quarters, the deputy speaker said that the poor performance of the contractor executing the project had been brought to the notice of CDA.

He said the construction, however, was far behind the schedule. The committee was informed that only 27 per cent work has been done so far.

He said that no further delay in revised scheduled of construction will be tolerated and directed CDA to blacklist the construction firm if it failed to complete the work within the given time.

The civic agency chairman assured the committee that he will personally monitor the pace of work and take all possible measures to complete the project as soon as possible.

The committee directed the chairman to submit detailed progress report about the construction work by next Monday.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 24^th, 2015.