USAID puts $250m project on hold

[Lahore_Real_Estate]

ISLAMABAD - Showing its deep concerns over the devolution of Higher Education Commission (HEC), the USAID has put $250 million project on hold, while the World Bank, another international donor, has threatened of scraping its $300 million programme.
Sources informed that USAID officials called on HEC Chairman Dr Javaid Laghari in his office and discussed the current scenario in the wake of the transfer of key functions of the commission to different federal and provincial institutions.
The sources said that the USAID was supposed to provide first instalment for the project of “Financial Assistant and Development Programme” which has been put on hold and the rest of the funding has also been frozen till the situation is not cleared about the roll of the HEC in future.
It has been learnt that the World Bank has also showed concern on the transfer of key functions of HEC to other ministries and institutes. It is very likely that the proposed devolution may deprive the HEC of $300 million soft loan to run its various programmes for three years.
According to the officials of the commission, confusion exists at the moment as no person in the government has officially spoken to any HEC officer about any plan and discussed the role of the commission in the future. The reality is that 80 per cent of the programmes actually being executed by the HEC are related to the federation, as they are defined in the Federal List Part I or Part II of the Constitution of Pakistan. They are of the view that there is no legal compulsion to devolve HEC under the 18th Amendment.
It is feared that if the HEC is devolved and a new commission, working under a government ministry, is created without autonomy, it will never be able to have the credibility that HEC enjoys, which will jeopardise the value of degrees issued by all institutions of Pakistan. Besides, that, the question does come to mind as to what kind of devolution is to be done with the moving degree recognition authority. It certainly does not happen anywhere else in the world, and this move will certainly diminish the credibility of degrees of all Pakistani institutions.