Safwanullah for repealing present allotment mechanism
By Asim Hussain

ISLAMABAD—Describing the present houses allotment mechanism for the federal government employees as the most inappropriate, Minister forHousing Syed Safwanullah on Wednesday advocated a new mechanism of allotment based on giving proprietary rights to the allottees.
Replying a query during question hour in the Senate, the minister describedthe present allotment system as “the most inappropriate” and said, accommodation problems of the government employees cannot be addressed under the present system.
He told the House that only 728 houses were constructed for the federalgovernment employees during last ten years and 17343 employees at Islamabad were still waiting for accommodation on the waiting list of the Estate Office.
He said in 1995 the then government has decided to stop construction ofhouses for the federal government employees.
“Neither any funds were allocated for further construction of houses nor anyhouse was constructed during last 11 years,” he said, adding, this brought the houseless employees figure to thousands. He said at present only 23000 to 24000 employees were having officialresidences out of total 380,000 showing an availability of just 5 to 6 per cent.
The minister said the Housing Ministry has moved a proposal of giving houseto employees on the ownership basis. For this, he proposed deducting instalments from their salaries during their service period and ensuring that at the time of retirement, they own a house of their own.
To another question, the minister told the House that Chanba House would be vacated by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) as soon as construction of their own building is completed.
To a point raised about corruption in the Estate Office, the ministeracknowledged that due to this practice there had been some problems. He said the Housing Ministry has replaced five Estate Officers on corruption charges and added, “I do not deny that people at Estate Office were involved in the practice of seeking money for allotment.”
He asked the members to bring to his notice the matter of seeking bribes bythe officials and assured strict action against them. The minister contested that the allotment mechanism in vogue cannot help resolve the accommodation problems even over the next 100 years. “We shall have to go for other options to appropriately tackle this problem,” Safwanullah said.