Press Releases

L to R: Mr. Zaheer Ul Islam Shah, Mr. Kinoshita Yasumitsu and Mr. Arif Baloch, at the signing ceremony

Islamabad, 5 August 2022: Record of Discussions (R/D) on the basic framework of implementation of the captioned technical cooperation project was signed and exchanged among Mr. KINOSHITA Yasumitsu, Chief Representative, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) Pakistan Office, Mr. Zaheer Ul Islam Shah, Secretary, Local Government, Election & Rural Development Department, Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Mr. Arif Baloch, Secretary, Local Council Board (LCB), Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Mr. Adil Akbar Khan, Joint Secretary (Japan), Ministry of Economic Affairs.

Since the merger of Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government is strongly committed to a sustainable development of the region and promotion of well-being of the people in Newly Merged Districts (NMDs), former FATA. At the same time, given the fact that civil services from local governments had not been provided to population in the districts before the merger, there are needs to enhance capacity of local government officials to provide sufficient services to the residents.

Therefore, this project has been formulated to enhance the capacity of the local government officers as well as Local Government School, a training institute for local government officers in KP to support them to acquire necessary practical skills and knowledge useful to undertake their duties.

In the first year of its implementation, this project will include activities such as trainings for 1) newly elected representatives, 2) officers in Regional Municipal Offices and Tehsil, 3) officers who are in charge of capacity development of local government officers.

The project will also expand its activities such as peer-to peer learnings and promotion of state-society dialogue at a later stage.

Through this technical cooperation, the Government of Japan and JICA continues to extend its cooperation in Pakistan for strengthening the capacity of local government officers of the Government of KP and to support a trust building between the government and the communities and promotion of well-being of citizens in KP.