Nobody on the body: Sans members, RDA walking administrative tightrope

Civic agency’s budgets being approved through ad-hoc set up for five years

RAWALPINDI: The Punjab government remains unable to constitute the governing body of the Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) for four years, creating a host of administrative problems over the same time period.

In the absence of the governing body, RDA has been facing problems in making major administrative decisions such as passing annual budgets. The government body was supposed to give final approval for the annual budgets of RDA, Parks and Horticulture Authority (PHA), and Water and Sanitation Agency (WASA).

In the last five years, the budgets of these organisations were passed by a finance sub-committee of the Punjab government under an ad hoc set up.

A senior RDA official told The Express Tribune that getting the budget approved from the sub-committee on finance was an emergency measure. He said that under the RDA laws, budget proposals were to be presented before the government body that would formally approved the budget.

Under RDA rules, a 15-member general body was to make major administrative and financial decisions in the authority.

According to the rules, the Punjab finance minister would be chairman of the general body. The 14 other members would include the Punjab planning and development board chairman, Punjab finance secretary, Punjab local governments secretary, Punjab housing, urban development and public health engineering department secretary, the Rawalpindi division commissioner, RDA director general, WASA managing director, the Rawalpindi city mayor, Rawalpindi district coordination officer, three Punjab Assembly members nominated by the government including one woman, and two technical members nominated by the Punjab government.

The RDA official, desiring anonymity, said that for the last five years, RDA, PHA, and WASA had been utilising their budgets without getting formal approval from the general body.

He, however, maintained that RDA recently sent a summary to the Punjab government for constitution of the general body. He said that he had received information that the Punjab chief secretary had approved the summary and the general body would be constituted after getting the go ahead from the chief minister.

The Express Tribune was unable to contact Commissioner Azmat Mahmood, who is the acting RDA director general, for his comments.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 29^th, 2016.