PESHAWAR - Leaders of opposition parties in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa strongly criticised allotting portfolios to corrupt persons by the PTI-led provincial government without prior investigation and termed it a major hurdle in the way of good governance and timely completion of various projects in the province.
Talking to The Nation Parliamentary Leader of Awami National Party [ANP] Sardar Hussain Babak questioned what kind of good governance the PTI government has brought to the province? He said that actual face of the PTI leaders have been exposed to the people who were earlier claiming that the party has an efficient team of experts who would improve the government machinery.
He said that it was third time that changes have been made in the cabinet and portfolios of various ministers have been changed during the last one year due to which the official work in the departments is at standstill while the projects which they had initiated were only limited to advertising campaign and ruthless use of public funds.
He said that the recent decisions of changing the portfolios of the ministers have been taken on the pressure of forward block, which had threatened to resign from their seats in case their demands were not met.
He said that the PTI government should take its decision in public interest not in favour of party as it they have been elected to vote for change. "Therefore, the PTI must give practical shape to its slogans, which it had made with the people," he added.
He lambasted the provincial government for running advertising campaign through private companies, which he named 'Inter-flow and Communication Spot' and said that huge funds of Rs100 million have been spent on these advertisements without taking the Information Department onboard.
He said that for the last two months the post of Information Director is vacant and no professional person has been notified to run the affair of the department.
He said that to hide corruption of various persons, an audit officer has been made Director of Information, which is against the rules and regulation of the department.
Provincial Information Secretary of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam(JUI-F) Maulana Jalil Jan said that there was no competent person in the cabinet to run the government's affairs transparently and despite passage of one year, the PTI government has so far not initiated any mega developmental projects in the province.
PTI Provincial General Secretary Khalid Masood said that bringing changes in the portfolios of the ministers and removing others is part of PTI transparency programme. He said that they have no proofs of any corruption against these ministers but they have been removed in the wake of public complaints.
When asked regarding the performance of the concerned departments due to repeated changes in the ministries. He said that all projects are going in right direction and there will be no halt in the ongoing projects. He said that this change would not affect the departmental performance of the government.
Qaumi Watan Party Parliamentary Leader Sikandar Hayat Khan Sherpao said that the PTI leadership is totally confused to run the affairs of the province, saying if Shaukat Yousafzi was a corrupt person then why the PTI government spent millions of rupees on Sehat Ka Insaf programme at the hand of a corrupt minister.
He also held the chief minister responsible for assigning portfolios to corrupt people without prior investigation. He demanded removal of other black sheep's from the provincial government who are busy looting the national exchequer.