PESHAWAR: After a similar effort drew a blank last year, chief of the ruling PTI Imran Khan has hinted at holding another donors’ conference to raise funds for the reconstruction of the flood-damaged infrastructure in Chitral district.

In December last year, the KP government organised a ‘partners’ workshop’ in Islamabad to raise funds for the reconstruction of the earthquake and flood-hit areas in the province.

Sources however told Dawn that the response of international agencies and friendly countries to the last year’s workshop was very cold and therefore, the event didn’t generate a significant amount of funds.

“Only UN Food and Agriculture Organisation came up with $60 million aid from among those, who attended the workshop,” a source said, adding that there were no more pledges of aid.

The source blamed Chitral nazim Maghfirat Shah for the fiasco saying he made an inappropriate speech before the forum telling participants that the government’s machinery was corrupt and therefore, donors should give aid directly to the district government.

“The nazim and provincial government were at cross purposes harming the effort to raise funds for flood and earthquake-hit areas,” he added.

Last year’s ‘partners workshop’ organised by KP govt for the purpose was a flop

On Wednesday, during a two days visit to Chitral, the PTI chief had said the provincial government had to slash its development spending to Rs113 billion from Rs142 billion after the federal government withheld KP budgetary allocations and that under those circumstances, the province was not in a position to rehabilitate Chitral’s infrastructure.

After attending a briefing at the Chitral deputy commissioner’s office, he said the provincial government had decided it would contact donor agencies to raise funds for the rehabilitation of the flood-damaged areas in Chitral and organise a conference for them in Islamabad soon.

Imran Khan said the rehabilitation of Chitral’s infrastructure would cost Rs16 billion, which the provincial government was unable to spare from its meagre resources.

He said currently, the PTI government was trying to restore the province’s infrastructure from its own resources.

When contacted, Chitral district nazim Maghfirat Shah said the Rs16 billion rehabilitation cost had been estimated by the district’s relevant departments.

He said the district government informed the PTI chief about the magnitude of destruction caused by floods and slower pace of reconstruction.

The nazim said Chitral continued to be in ruins as rehabilitation and reconstruction hadn’t begun in more than a year.

“Zero per cent rehabilitation and reconstruction work has been carried out across the district,” he said.

The July-August 2015 devastating floods triggered by torrential rains and glacial lake outburst floods had caused widespread damage to public property throughout the district besides killing 36 people and injuring scores.

The Chitral Floods 2015 Recovery Needs Assessment and Action Framework prepared by the Provincial Disaster Management Authority had put recovery and reconstruction cost at Rs8.75 billion.

Of the amount, Rs177 million was meant to be spent on education, Rs129.92 million on housing and Rs331.76 million on water schemes.

In addition, the government required to spend Rs3.036 billion to reconstruct roads, Rs1.253 billion on bridges, Rs1.3 billion to rebuild power houses and Rs1.447 billion on agricultural sector.

Ironically, the Reshun hydel power station, which used to cater to over 15,000 households throughout the district and was completely destroyed in floods, hasn’t been restored so far plunging the region into darkness.

When contacted, special assistant to the chief minister for information Mushtaq Ghani said he would get back after getting information from relevant department.

However, his cellphone was later found switched off on repeated attempts.

Published in Dawn, July 2nd, 2016