Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Pervez Khattak was called by a delegation of international NGO Global Learning Trust at chief minister house Peshawar. The NGO assured the provision of the donation of Rs19 billion for overcoming the missing facilities in all schools and hospitals by this year as well as a total of Rs50 billion to overcome deficiencies in various social sectors to improve service delivery of the institutions in the province.
The chief minister also chaired a meeting to review the needs of concerning departments in this regard which was attended by representatives of the trust, Provincial Education Minister Muhammad Atif Khan, Minister Excise Mian Jamshaiduddin Kakakhel, Principal Secretary to Chief Minister Muhammad Israr Khan, administrative secretaries and planning officers of elementary and secondary education, finance, higher education, health, excise and taxation and social welfare departments who presented detailed estimates and public needs of various departments.
The delegation led by Vice Chairman of Trust Qaiser Zaman assured that the funds would be made available and transferred to the provincial kitty soon after approval of the estimates from donors’ forum in UK that included medical equipment for health institutions of the province including and three major hospitals for Peshawar costing Rs14 billion and construction of eight to nine thousand additional rooms in primary and higher secondary schools costing Rs5 billion to cater the needs of the locals by end of this year. He further assured that the donations amount would reach up to Rs50 billion by February next year to remove deficiencies of other social sector departments and thus, fulfill the needs of the public to the maximum extent.
It may be recalled that President of the Trust and UNO Ambassador Dr Rubina Haider Ali called on Chief Minister Pervez Khattak some time back and offered welfare services of her trust to the province wherein the chief minister invited the trust which visited Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and saw the needs of the province and its people. However, he lauded the welfare activities of the trust in rest of the country including Balochistan and hoped that such welfare contributions would also be extended to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa that was affected by terrorism and natural calamities.
Pervez Khattak while talking to the delegation said that his government believed in exploiting its natural resources for sustainable development of the province rather than relying on help from the outside or begging for foreign aid or loans. He said that his government preferred national interest and it did not accept conditionality of donors and NGOs for development and welfare.
He said, “We are pursuing our own developmental strategies to fulfill the desires and needs of the people and the results are also encouraging as the people were benefited from the development work.” However, he made it clear that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government would welcome the national and international NGOs that come forward for the development and welfare of this province and its people.
He thanked the offer of the trust for catering to the basic needs of the province in health and education sectors. He said that it was a test case for the trust and mutual confidence and goodwill would flourish if the trust ensured availability of Rs19 billion for both the sectors by December this year as promised.
He said that it was also good omen that the trust has so far spent Rs40 billion on providing facilities to the people in health, education, agriculture, solar energy and other sectors in the backward province of Balochistan wherein fruitful results were yield. Khattak said that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government also intended for such result oriented welfare expectations from the trust so that institutions were strengthened enough to perform the service delivery in befitting manner and the province marches ahead on road of progress and prosperity.