Towards enlightenment: Imran says govt will improve with time

Inaugurates power stations in Battagram

BATTAGRAM: The provincial government has learnt a great deal over time and the nation is likely to see progress in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa after a year.

This was said by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairperson Imran Khan. He was speaking to participants of a public meeting organised in Shamlai village, Battagram on Wednesday. Imran went to inaugurate two micro-power stations.

“We are learning because we came into power for the first time, but you will see further improvement by next year”, he said.

Imran added he was committed to bringing the system of governance to the desired level. He said the launch of the micro-hydel projects was a step towards improving living standards of the people. At a cost of Rs5 billion, he hoped the plant would supply uninterrupted power supply at cheaper rates to 350,000 consumers in far-flung hilly areas.

Imran hoped the completion of 1,000 micro powerhouses would benefit thousand of rural consumers. He said this would not only put an end to the menace of power outages, but also create new job opportunities in remote areas.

He said locals would run and manage these micro-power stations themselves.

“It was my vision that a local government system be put in place to empower village, tehsil and district councils to make their own decisions,” he said. “It has now been realised in K-P.”

About development and prosperity in the west, the PTI chief said it was because those countries had successful local government systems and rulers were not implementing decisions from a distance. He said there were more chances of misappropriation if expenditure is centralised compared to devolution at a lower level.

Without naming the Sharifs, he said Punjab was spending Rs200 billion on the 27-kilometre Orange Train in Lahore, while K-P’s total development budget was Rs120 billion. “The nation will witness theft worth of billions in this project whenever the audit is conducted”, he said.

Criticising the Punjab government’s coal-fed power generation, Imran said this method was almost phased out in China, while the rest of the world was closing down similar projects as people were aware the system was a major contributor to environmental pollution.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 26^th, 2016.