The National Assembly Standing Committee on States and Frontier Regions has recommended to the federal government to release Rs. 860 million immediately in order to complete the rehabilitation process of the Internally-Displaced People (IDP) belonging to Kurram Agency in time, and minimize the difficulties of the affected people.
The meeting was held under the chairmanship of Member National Assembly (MNA) Sajid Hussain Turi.The Committee was briefed by the Kurram Agency Political Agent on the utilization of funds of Rs.1.86 billion sanctioned by the Prime Minister (PM) for the rehabilitation of the displaced persons of the Agency.
He informed that Rs. 1 billion were released to the Political Administration in the financial year 2010-2011 and 860 million of the sanctioned amount was not yet released for the rehabilitation of the displaced persons of Kurram Agency.
He further informed that 4,239 houses were damaged completely and 1,329 houses were damaged partially during the sectarian clashes in Kurram Agency. Payment of compensation was being made at the place of return through cross cheques in the name of the affected persons in order to ensure payment only to the actual affected civilians of that area, he added.
He also informed the meeting that compensation for completely damaged houses was being made in two installments.
The first installments 150,000/- was given on the return of the affected people to their villages and the second installment was being released on the basis of a second survey only to those affected people who had started re-construction of their damaged houses.
Economic Affairs Division Secretary also participated in the meeting and briefed the Committee over the progress being made with the International Donors Agencies regarding funds provided by them in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) areas.
The Committee expressed its displeasure over the incomplete briefings given by Economic Affairs Division (EAD) and FATA Secretariat on the given agenda.
The Committee decided to hold the next meeting in the near future and also directed the FATA Secretariat, EAD and Peoples Works Program (PM Secretariat) to come fully prepared before the Committee in connection with the development projects completed/ongoing schemes in FATA.
The meeting was attended by Minister for Sates & Frontier Regions Engineer Shaukatullah , MNAs Jawad Hussain, Engineer Muhammad Tariq Khattak, Murtaza Javed Abbasi, Dr. Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, Mir Ahmadan Khan Bugti, Imrana Saeed Jamil, Lt. Gen. (Retd) Abdul Qadir Baloch, Maulvi Asmatullah and senior officers from the Ministry, FATA Secretariat and relevant departments were also present in the meeting.
