ISLAMABAD: In a landmark development towards integration of the erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), the provincial chief secretary directed that the director of the FATA Health Services would report to the health secretary of the province instead of the FATA Secretariat from now onward.
In its notification, the Establishment Division of the province stated that in pursuance of integration and merger of erstwhile FATA with the Pakhtunkhwa and in order to provide better line administrative management, the FATA health services director shall henceforth report to the provincial health secretary in all official business.
It was stated that subsequent modalities on other auxiliary matters would be decided shortly. “In case of issues in financing, development schemes and other matters relating to erstwhile FATA viz-a-viz federal government and other partners, the health secretary may communicate and route cases as per current arrangements accordingly.”
Under the twenty-fifth constitutional amendment, integration of the FATA Secretariat with the KP’s Civil Secretariat, it was planned that in the first phase, FATA Health to be shifted to the Health Department along with the directorates of social sector department of the FATA Secretarial to KP Secretariat and education to KP Education Department within three months.
It was great steps in this regard, since health facilities in the province were overstretched due to the influx of the patients from the FATA areas because of lack of infrastructure in the region, besides ghost health centres and ghost employees, huge funds meant for providing healthcare to the tribal people were being misused due to lack of proper monitoring and strong accountability mechanism.
