Flood-hit Chitral villagers seek audit of project funds

CHITRAL: The people from flood-affected villages in Chitral on Friday demanded an independent audit of the money spent under a project launched to reconstruct the damaged infrastructure and rehabilitate the calamity-hit population.
A number of residents from the flood-hit villages said the infrastructure collapsed when flash floods in Bindugole, Gohkir in upper Chitral struck three villages including Doqandah, Bindu Shitragh and Shogram on July 2 to 4 July. A United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)-funded Pakistan GIOF Project was launched in the area two and half years ago for protecting and saving lives, properties and lands of the flood-affected people of Bindugole.
They said a so-called Disaster Risk Management Committee (DRMC) was constituted to run the activities of the project effectively but the flood-affected people of Bindugole were totally neglected. The members of the committee, they deplored, used this money for rehabilitating playgrounds, building Eidgah, model schools and recreational facilities instead of spending the money on required places.
The project had set aside a large amount to construct protection walls on both sides of Bindugole. However, the project manager and DRMC members neglected the most dangerous village Shalalboomi Doqandah.
“The protection walls have been swept away by flooding,” said one of the affectees.
The project had allotted a large amount to construct shelters for the flood-affected people of Bindugole but instead the members of DRMC wasted the huge money on building playgrounds, Eidgah, model school playgrounds. According to the statement of the project manager, Hamid Ahmad Mir, these shelters were well-equipped with the basic facilities of life including tents, beds, mobile toilets, generators and utensils for the flood affected people of Bindugole.
The affected people said the displaced people asked for these things when the flood struck the area but to no avail. The affectees were not accommodated in the shelters and the displaced people were forced to take shelter with neighbours in Masjid and Darul Uloom. There are five watch groups to inform the endangered villages at the time of flood but no one responded when the calamity struck, they added. The affected people called for dissolution of the DRMC and its replacement with a new one comprising of the affected people of Bindugole and the project staff.