PDMA Defends Sacking Of PaRRSA Employees

PESHAWAR, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Jan, 2017 ) : The Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) Tuesday defended the sacking of some PaRRSA employees to reduce burden on the public exchequer in the wake of departure of donors, besides reduction in militancy in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 2016.

A PDMA spokesman, in a statement here, alleged that only a few sacked employees of the Provincial Rehabilitation and Reconstruction and Settlement Authority (PaRRSA) were issuing fabricated stories to the media to further their personal interest and malign the department.

He said the list of sacked employees contained Names of people from Nowshera district, home constituency of KP chief minister, which negated the allegations of nepotism. The process of continuation and discontinuation of contracts was carried out after detailed performance evaluation of the employees, he added.

He stated that since militancy in the province was on the decline in the aftermath of operation Zarb-e-azab and that the year 2016 was by far the most calm year as no major natural disaster occurred which further necessitated the need for rationalization of staff in PaRRSA and thereby reducing the burden on its declining exchequer after the departure of donors.

He said in line with the observations recorded on summary by the P&D and Finance Department and dully approved by the chief minister, the PDMA in consultation with the members took the decision regarding extension or discontinuation of employees' contracts.

No list of employees was forwarded to the CM either for continuation or discontinuation of the PaRRSA employees, he added. The summary approved by the Chief Minister, he said, was meant only for continuation of PaRRSA with the condition that RR&S Department and PDMA progressively rationalize the staff.

He said the chief minister had agreed to the proposal with the condition that the number of staff would be reduced in a phased manner so that the performance of the organization was not affected.

The spokesman due to long standing association of PaRRSA employees with public sector reconstruction and rehabilitation and their experience the RR&S Department moved a summary to the chief minister for continuation of PaRRSA proposing that its future operations could be funded from an amount of Rs 142 .92 million accrued as savings due to the last few years of its operations as a result of dollar/rupee exchange rate.

Since inception in July 2009, UNDP had been funding salaries and operational cost of PaRRSA which continued till March 2012 while since April 2012 USAID had been funding the same which also ended on June 30, 2016.

PaRRSA was established by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government in July 2009 and administratively it was placed under the setup of PDMA for facilitation of donors and fast track approval of schemes and projects.