BRT report: PDA ex-DG offers himself for accountability

PESHAWAR: The former director general of Peshawar Development Authority (PDA), Israrul Haq, has sent a letter to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and offered himself for accountability in the project.

Israrul Haq, also former project director for the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project, has been transferred by the provincial government in the wake of a Provincial Inspection Team’s report on the multi-billion rupees BRT in Peshawar.

“Since I have relinquished the charges, I feel obliged to offer myself for accountability to all the relevant fora in general and your esteemed organisation in particular,” he stated in a letter sent to the director general, NAB, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The letter was sent by the PDA DG on April 1 while he was relinquishing his duties.

“I would take this opportunity to solemnly declare that during my tenure, I have carried out the government business with honesty before God and the public and with utmost transparency to the extent of my human capacity,” the letter stated.

He stated that during his stay as the PDA DG, he tried his level best to take all decisions purely based on merit and in the best interest of the authority and the public at large.

“Today, when I am leaving the office, the official record of PM’s Delivery Unit (PMDU) rates PDA at 93 percent in terms of ‘problem-solving’, with 88 percent citizen satisfaction. I am also leaving the BRT as project director with civil work substantially completed,” Israrul Haq stated in the letter to the NAB.

After the official report on the multi-billion rupees BRT, the chief minister transferred heads of the two departments executing the BRT project, including the then PDA DG Israrul Haq and Secretary Transport and Mass Transit Flight Lieutenant (r) Kamran Rehman.

The 27-page Provincial Inspection Team report said that havoc has been played with the public money through faulty planning and designing, negligence in the execution of work, and poor management of the project.

The report was compiled on the orders of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief minister.

The inspection team in its report, submitted to the government on January 30, recommended fixing of responsibility for faulty design and execution of work causing loss to the government.

Following the direction of the Peshawar High Court, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has already submitted its preliminary findings on the Rs67.8 billion mega project funded by the Asian Development Bank and submitted to the court.

However, the PHC kept the report sealed after the provincial government got a stay order over the proceedings of the PHC in the BRT project from the Supreme Court of Pakistan and the case is still pending in the Supreme Court. The PHC could not proceed in the case until a decision of the Supreme Court.