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| International donors to give 800 USD more to quake-hit Pakistan | | | Islamabad, Oct 8
Major international donor agencies, led by the World Bank, while indicating to make available an additional 800 million dollars or ‘even more’ as sought by President General Pervez Musharraf for reconstruction work in the quake-affected northern Pakistan and the occupied Kashmir region, has asked the government to ensure that there is no corruption.
''Certainly there is a scope for corruption considering such a huge reconstruction task and this requires strict and regular monitoring by the government agencies concerned,'' The Dawn newspaper quoted Mr John Wall, Country Director of the World Bank, as saying here.
The international community, which had pledged over six billion dollars for reconstruction and rehabilitation of the quake-hit areas, repeatedly asked the Pakistani government to formulate a corruption mitigation policy and place reconstruction activities of the armed forces under the Accountant General of Pakistan instead of the military's own audit and accounts system.
However, Mr Wall said, there was not much noise about corruption keeping in view the massive reconstruction work spread over many years.
''The problem is being faced in the housing sector where the role of revenue and district officers along with other officials concerned is to ensure that there is no corruption involved,'' Mr Wall said.
Generally, he said, things were moving in the right direction and the international donor agencies and government functionaries were cooperating to mitigate the suffering of the quake survivors.
He said the World Bank, which had earlier pledged 1 billion dollar was planning to offer another 400 million dollar for reconstruction. ''Besides grants, we and other international lenders would extend more financial resources,'' he said.
Economic Affairs Division (EAD) Secretary Khalid Saeed said so far 2.6 billion dollar, which also included grants and assistance given in kind, had been disbursed by donor agencies and bilateral donors.
''There is no delay in disbursement,'' he said, adding that Pakistan was providing details of various projects and was getting funding from donor agencies. Most of the funds, he said, were in the shape of soft loans.
Asked whether the government had asked the donors to convert the remaining funds into grants, he said negotiations were going on.
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