Islamabad: 15th February, 2017:  The National Assembly Standing Committee on House and Library expressed its displeasure over the failure in construction of Additional Family suites and servant quarters at parliament lodges within the stipulated time. The Committee, therefore, decided to convene a joint meeting of National Assembly and Senate Standing Committees on House and Library on 23rd February, 2017 to ascertain the reasons for delay in construction of additional family suites and devise joint mechanism to take action against the responsible of this failure. This decision was taken in a meeting of the National Assembly Standing Committee on House and Library which met under the Chairmanship of the Deputy Speaker National Assembly Murtaza Javed Abbasi at Parliament House, today.

The Deputy Speaker resented the failure in construction of family suites at Parliament Lodges and said that the Project was started in May, 2011 and was supposed to be completed in November 2013. However due to negligence of CDA and Construction Firm, the work on the said project could not be completed till date.  He said that despite several commitments before the Committee neither the construction firm nor the CDA management made any sincere efforts to complete the project. The members of the committee also expressed their grave concerns over the delay and unanimously recommended for strict action against the responsible for inordinate delay and also recommended for joint meeting of the National Assembly and Senate Standing Committees on House and Library to take final decision on the issue.

The Chairman (CDA) informed the committee that in compliance of the decision of the Committee passed during its meeting held on 21.12.2016, a three Member Committee headed by the Member (P &D) CDA was constituted to probe the facts on the failure of completion of 104 Family Suites and Servant Quarters.  He also admitted that the CDA was an executing agency and responsible to get the work completed within stipulated time.  While apprising the Committee about the report, the Member (P &D) CDA informed that the Department, Consultant and Construction Firm were responsible of inordinate delay in construction of this project.  He also informed the Committee that CDA has imposed 10% penalty on the Construction Firm and on the directions of the Committee the work on the site has been stopped, whereby the Construction Firm had pleaded to Arbitrator against the decision of CDA.  The CDA was awaiting the decision of the Arbitrator. 

The Project Manager, National Assembly Secretariat also informed the Committee about the irregularities in awarding the contract to the Construction Company and Consultant by the CDA of the Project.  The Deputy Speaker remarked that the CDA and contractor had breached the privilege of the Committee and dishonored their commitment. He said that the contractor had wasted 6 years and due to his irresponsibility the members of parliament had to suffer.

The Committee also expressed its annoyance over the non-implementation of decision/recommendation and enquires ordered by the House and Library Committee since 2013 in respect of Parliament Lodges. The Committee Members expressed their dissatisfaction over the report submitted by the CDA about the facts finding inquiries.  The Members remarked that the actions taken against the responsible in those inquires were very lenient and the Officers appointed for the inquiry did not bother to take any action against their colleagues, those who were responsible for huge loss to national exchequer. The Deputy Speaker has constituted a sub-committee under the convenership of  Ch. Jaffar Iqbal, MNA to review the report of the facts findings inquiries and submit its report in the next meeting of the Committee.     

The Committee also discussed the status of possession of plots to the Employees of the National Assembly Employees Cooperative Housing Society.  The Committee expressed Its displeasure over delaying tactics in handing over the possession of plots to the National Assembly Secretariat employees by the Federal Employees Cooperative Housing Society (FECHS). 

The Committee was attended by MNAs Malik Ibrar Ahmed, Sardar Mumtaz Khan,  Ch. Jaffar Iqbal Dr. Ibadullah, Mr. Aqib Ullah Khan, Dr. Mehreen Razaque Bhutto, Mrs. Shahida Rehmani,  Mr. Mehboob Alam, Molana Qamar ud Din,