The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Tuesday observed that state lands owned by Pakistan Railways, Pakistan Army, the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) and the Evacuee Trust Property Board were not always managed according to prescribed rules.
This was disclosed by PAC Monitoring and Implementation Committee’s report for the year 2008-09 that was presented in the House on Tuesday. The report said, “Encroachment of state land takes place on a large scale, at times by state agencies themselves.”
On procurement of goods and services, the report said procurements were made in violation of PPRA rules, resulting in non-transparent procurements. The PAC also observed that the pre-qualification process was misused to favour certain vendors.
“In a significant number of departments, it has been observed that structured internal control systems either do not exist or are ineffective. Ineffectiveness of control system leads to repetitive wide spread irregularities, both procedural and substantive,” the PAC report added.
It further said state assets, particularly government vehicles, were misused, particularly programme and project vehicles. It further said that stores were not insured and large scale thefts, particularly in Pakistan Railways and WAPDA, occurred usually in connivance with staff.
The PAC report said there was a large number of instances in which management of governing boards and autonomous bodies misused its freedom and autonomy in the following areas: A) Re-employment of retired government servants in violation of rules. B) Investment of funds in violation of the instruction of the ministry of finance and C) Grant of unjustified perks to the employees and even to board members.
Meanwhile, Public Accounts Committee Chairman Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on Tuesday presented the reports of the PAC for the years 1990-91, 1992-93, 1994-95, 1997-98, 2001-02, 2008-09 and the Annual Report 2010 in the National Assembly and received appreciation from the House.