- Finance minister chairs meeting to review progress on new secretariat
The Kohsar Block, the New Pak Secretariat, would be ready for operations by the end of this month as the construction work had been completed while the remaining works for operationalisation of the block would be completed by July end.
Federal Minister for Finance Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar on Wednesday chaired a meeting to review the progress of the operationalisation of the block during which he was briefed about the work progress. Senator Dar urged the Ministry of Housing and Works and PWD to complete all remaining works by the end of the current month.
He said that the operationalisation of the Kohsar Block would enable accommodation of various government ministries and departments under one roof, which would improve facilitation of the general public. He said that the space allocation of the block should be done soon in order to decide on various requests for allotment of the offices from different ministries and the departments.
He said that the priority in space allocation would be accorded to the ministries and the departments, which were paying high amounts as rent, so that maximum saving of exchequer could be made. The minister also urged officials of the Finance Division and the Planning, Development & Reform Division to extend maximum facilitation for the completion of all necessary works.
Earlier, Housing and Works secretary and PWD director general briefed the minister on the progress of the project. The meeting was also briefed on various aspects of the interior design and partitioning of space for allocation to different ministries and the departments. The secretary informed the minister that partitioning of the space would be finalised after allocation of offices in order to ensure that the partitioning is in accordance with the requirements of each ministry or department.
Senior officials of the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Housing and Works, Ministry of Planning, Development & Reform and PWD also attended the meeting. It is important to mention here that the Kohsar Block was conceived and planned by former prime minister Shaukat Aziz. The project was launched in 2007 and had to be completed within three years.
The initial cost estimate of the project was Rs 3.5 billion but its cost has increased manifolds due to the delay. The structure of building was ready in early 2009 but then onwards it’s never ending internal finishing work started that made everybody involved in the project a millionaire, said an official source.
The government has to pay millions of rupees every month as rent for the buildings hired for different departments functioning in rented buildings, the new block was not being allocated to the ministries.
