PESHAWAR: To improve the capacity of local government representatives, officials and strengthen development planning at the grassroots level, a four-year project supported by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) helped improve local governance in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
In this connection, at least 19 tehsil in KP’s merged districts prepared and approved four-year Medium-Term Development Plans (MTDPs) after identifying local development needs through extensive community consultations.
The plans were prepared under a project implemented by the KP Local Government, Elections and Rural Development Department in collaboration with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
The project focused on strengthening local governments, improving the capacity of elected representatives and officials, and promoting development planning based on the needs of local communities. More than 2,500 community consultation meetings were held under the project, through which over 18,500 development needs were identified. These needs were then used to prepare four-year development plans for the 19 tehsil local governments, which were later approved by their respective tehsil councils.
The project also helped strengthen the functioning of the tehsil councils. All 19 councils became operational, held regular meetings and formed statutory committees. Through the Local Governance School, 808 elected council members and local government officials were trained, including 163 women. Another 763 elected representatives and officials received special training in tehsil profiling and medium-term development planning.
The tehsil councils also completed 49 small-scale development initiatives, including skills training, sports activities and awareness campaigns. The initiatives benefited 10,725 people, including 2,325 women. According to KP Local Government Minister Mena Khan Afridi the project provided an opportunity to elected representatives of merged disricts to directly participate in identifying their development needs and planning for them.
He said a formal local government system was established in the merged districts after the 25th Constitutional Amendment, while there had previously been no formal mechanism for consulting local communities about their development needs. The minister directed the relevant departments to include the medium-term development plans prepared by the tehsils in the Annual Development Programmes (ADPs).
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