By By Aftab Maken
Three officers of the Ministry of Food & Agriculture (MinFA) Abdul Ghaffar Arain, Project Director M&E, Fazal Subhan section officer Planning and Muhammad Ali Shah Budget & Accounts officer drafted this report on direction of the competent authority and the report was exclusively available with The News.
The report says irregularities and misuse of the project resources were detected from the records made available to the inspection team by the concerned officers of the Federal Project Monitoring Unit (FPMU).
The agribusiness project was meant to support economic growth and employment generation in the agriculture sector and had an estimated cost of Rs4.066 billion with ADB assistance of Rs1.86 billion while the remaining is the share of government of Pakistan (GoP).
The report reveals that no records of Rs419 million paid to the provincial governments, organization and various agencies were available with the project management. The project management paid Rs353,926 to National Insurance Corporation (NIC) for vehicle insurance, says the report, even though the government project was not required to be insured.
The project reported huge unspent/lapsed funds of Rs18 million and Rs264m during 2006-07 and 2007-08 respectively, whereas, the project management did not make payments of Rs12m for purchasing machinery and equipments for Department of Agriculture, Livestock Products Marketing and Grading (DALPMG).
Under the terms and conditions of the appointment letter to every officer of the project, they were paid un-approved rate of daily and travelling allowances. The reported TA/DA claims is Rs5,700 payable each day for project director while it is Rs1,200 for the lower satff, the report objects saying that the said rates for TA/DA are not admissible.
The report also pointed out disbursing 100 per cent salary from ADB fund without the clearance from Finance division or AGPR. This clearly violates PC-1 and loan agreement and amounts to embezzlement.
The irregularities pertaining to administrative issues include extension in contract appointments, excesses use of powers for personal gains, unauthorized expenditure, misuse/unauthorized use of official transport and irregular engagement of employees on contract services.
Akram Khalid, being head of the project performed out-station tours for three month (nine occasions) during his six month service from Feb 13, 2008 to Aug 9, 2008 by receiving an amount of Rs323,165 on account of TA/DA, the report termed it unauthorized expenditure without tour justification and also without approval from secretary MinFA or head of department i.e. ALMA/Joint Secretary (Plan).
There is no maintenance of official transport record either by the project director or other officers of the project leading to not only misuse but also excessive use/incur of expenditure on transport, it said.
Under the contract agreement of project director, he was offered lump sum amount of Rs150,000 per month inclusive of pay, house rent, utilities and the expenditure regarding entitlement of one 1000 cc car with monthly POL limit of 180 litres, but Khalid is exclusively using the official car.
The report observed that Project Director and two Deputy Project Directors from July 12, 2007 to Oct 15, 2008 (15 months) have incurred vehicle expensis of Rs1.117 million (Rs816,978 for purchase of POL and Rs300,170 for repair). Besides above from Feb 12, 2006 to Oct 12, 2008 (32 months), the expenditure on two vehicles (Toyota Hi-ace and Suzuki Potohar) stated to be on transport pool, have incurred an expenditure of Rs993,615 (Rs842,763 on POL purchase and Rs150,852 on repair).
Contrary to the powers of Project Director, Akram Khalid extended contract employments of a number of officers and officials of the project whereas only secretary MinFA is only authorized to do so. Out of total Rs4.06 billion projects, an allocation of Rs294 million is for international and local consultants.
National and international consultants were hired or their terms were extended by the Project Director without approval of the Additional Secretary/Secretary, MinFAL which is clear violation of the contract as well as the government rules, it added. The report expressed its dissatisfaction over the performance of local and international and consultants when compared to their output targets.