In a rather arduous journey of three years, millions of rupees have been lost to increasing infrastructural costs as the construction of the regional blood centre in Islamabad remained stuck between “Groundbreaking” ceremony and “Laying Foundation Stone” ceremony, Daily Times has learnt reliably.
Earlier on May 3, 2016, then federal minister Tariq Fazal Chaudhry launched the groundbreaking of the centre in a grand ceremony, which was held here in a five-star hotel.
As per sources, no practical measures were taken for the construction afterwards while officials appointed for the project continued getting their salaries along with other perks and privileges.
A few days earlier, after a lapse of almost three years, the newly appointed Special Assistant to Prime Minister Imran Khan on Health Dr Zafar Mirza laid the foundation stone of the same regional centre.
Interestingly, with the exception of a few officials, all participants of the ceremony were the same as those who had attended the previous groundbreaking ceremony.
Establishing the centre in the federal capital was a part of the Safe Blood Transfusion Programme (SBTP) project, funded by the government of Germany, with an aim to initiate the restructuring of the blood transfusion system via a centralized model. This was said to be achieved through the establishment of regional centres in all provinces. The ministry of national health services was the overall custodian of this project.
According to sources, the sluggish approach of the authorities concerned had caused losses to the tune of millions to the national exchequer.
An official privy to all affairs of the programme noted, “The construction cost of 2019 will higher millions of rupees than the construction cost of 2016.”
When contacted, SBTP National Coordinator Dr Hassan Abbass Zaheer admitted the delay in commencement of construction on the centre.
He, however, defended by saying that the delay had occurred due to several issues.
The land acquisition and devolution after the 18th constitutional amendment remained the biggest issues among others, he added.
Dr Zaheer further claimed that during the first phase of the project, it had been planned to establish nine regional centres in all provinces of the country, including Azad Jammu and Kashmir.
“All other centres’ construction work has been completed and they are now functional and has been yielding very positive results. Initiation of only one centre took little time due to said un-avoidable reasons”, he recalled.
In order to assess the progress of these centres, we had prepared three annual reports so far, Dr Zaheer maintained.
He also claimed that 14 more regional blood centres across the country were a part of Phase-II under the project while adding that the development work would start soon after the completion of the basic documentary procedure.
Dr Zaheer, however, avoided sharing the total allocated amount of each centre and its total estimated cost.
A senior official in the health ministry, wishing to remain anonymous, said that Prime Minister Imran Khan was very serious in prioritising this project. He added that unlike previous predecessors, he was ambitious to create circumstances wherein the desirable results could be yielded under the program.
The official disclosed that the PC-I for Phase-II of the programme had been submitted by the ministry to the German government, which would be approved soon hopefully.