KP to take water dues, canal issues to CCI

PESHAWAR, April 25: The provincial government will take up the issues of nonpayment of dues by other provinces for using Khyber Pakhtunkhwa water and delay in implementation of the Chashma Right Bank Canal (CRBC) project in coming meetings of the Council of Common Interests (CCI) and inter-provincial coordination, Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain told the assembly on Monday. Minister for Irrigation Pervez Khattak said that claims for using water by other provinces had been raised with the federal government several times, but to no avail. He was responding to a question raised by JUI-F MPA Mufti Kifayatullah. Mr Khattak said that according to the Water Accord 1992 the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa couldn't use its share due to lack of infrastructure. "We have been making demands to the federal government to financially support this province in improving the irrigation system so as to use its water share for getting self-sufficiency in the agriculture sector," he said. The house also unanimously passed a joint resolution, demanding of the federal government to put the CRBC 1st Lift project on the agenda of Executive Committee of National Economic Counsel (ECNEC) as announced by the prime minister. Israrullah Gandhapur of PPP-S tabled the resolution, which was signed by Senior Minister Bashir Bilour, Abdul Akbar Khan of PPP, Mufti Kifayatullah of JUI-F, PML-N MPA Javed Abbassi and Munawar Khan. "Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani had announced the CRBC project during the ECNEC meeting," Mr Gandhapur said while reading text of the resolution and added that some elements were making hurdles to the implementation of this useful project. He said that this province had suffered huge economics losses in the continued anti-terrorism struggle, which should be compensated with the implementation of mega projects. He said that the provincial government had been paying billions of rupees in subsidy on buying wheat. He said that if the CRBC project was implemented this province would become self-sufficient in production of wheat and other crops. "Through this resolution we demand of the prime minister to put the CRBC project on the ECNEC agenda and approve it immediately," the PPP-S MPA said. The assembly also passed amendments to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Procedure and Conduct of Business Rules 1988, to ensure the production of any of the MPA, who is in custody in connection with any offence, to attend the assembly. Dr Faiza Rasheed of the PPP walked out from the assembly proceedings to record her protest over, what she called, discriminatory attitude of the assembly secretariat. The PPP member said that she was not less than the other MPAs politically and educationally then why the assembly secretariat was ignoring her. "No resolution, call attention and privilege motion suggested by me has been tabled so far in the last three years," she said. Dr Faiza asked her parliamentary leader Abdul Akbar Khan to cancel her membership as she didn't want to be a show piece here if she can't raise any issue. Later, on the request of Speaker Kiramatullah Chagharmatti, Abdul Akbar, Minister for Higher Education Qazi Asad and Minister for Social Welfare Sitara Ayaz brought her back to the house. Speaking on a call attention notice, Ms Noor Sehar drew attention of the house to the destruction of water channels by last year's floods in Swat. She said that farmers were unable to irrigate their orchards and other crops, which had damaged the economy of Swat. He demanded of the government to take steps for reconstruction of all the destroyed irrigation channels. Minister for Irrigation Pervez Khattak said that the government couldn't reconstruct the water channels because it had no income from them. However, he said that the government had decided to provide 50 per cent financial support to those owners of the land, who wanted to reconstruct the water channels. The house also passed The Provincial Motor Vehicle (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) (Amendment) Bill, 2011 and The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Local Government (Amendment) Bill, 2011. The speaker adjourned the session till Tuesday morning.