NACTA assigned only Rs109.42m in budget

Allocation 90% lower than funds set aside for counter-terrorism body in last fiscal year

ISLAMABAD: The federal government is perhaps reluctant to make the National Counter Terrorism Authority (Nacta) a fully functional entity – judging from its modest Rs109.42 million allocation in the federal budget.

Budget documents show that the total allocation is 90 per cent lower than the funds set aside for the counter-terrorism body in the last fiscal year.

Nacta itself had demanded Rs1.8 billion to meet its requirements.



As the premier watchdog in the country, Nacta is also responsible for implementing most points of the 20-point National Action Plan (NAP) and delineate counter terrorism policies. In fact, the fourth point of NAP solely calls for strengthening Nacta.

When the finance ministry does not want to give funds to any government entity, it simply glosses over its funding needs or earmarks only a tiny share of its required budget.

A Joint Intelligence Directorate (JID), including all security agencies, was supposed to be set up at Nacta.

In its budgetary estimations, Nacta sought an allocation of Rs1,032.43 million for setting up the JID. No rocket science is needed to determine the fate of JID after this meagre allocation.

Interestingly, matters pertaining to Nacta are administratively looked after by the interior ministry and the prime minister directly looks after its operational activities.



During the past financial year, the finance ministry had released Rs1.06 billion for Nacta and officials concerned were optimistic about getting the proposed budgetary allocation this time around too.

Nacta was made functional again, at least on paper, in the wake of the Army Public School (APS) attack. However, the allocation of funds has been a thorny issue as the finance ministry has been reluctant to release funds because of unknown reasons.

The seriousness of the government could also be gauged by the fact that not a single meeting of the body’s board of governors (BoG), which is required to meet on quarterly basis, has taken place so far. Nacta’s board is headed by the prime minister and a summary was moved months ago, requesting the premier to convene the first meeting of Nacta board.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 5^th, 2016.