‘Eaten Away’ – Audit Report Reveals Corruption worth Billions
The Audit Report for the year 2006-07, presented to the National Assembly by the Auditor General of Pakistan, discloses an awfully large sum of money that was misappropriated or used irregularly in both the defense services and the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) of Pakistan. Figures reveal misappropriation of more than 18 billion rupees in the defense services and over 24 billion rupees in WAPDA. And these figures are for the year 2006-07 alone!

The audit report detailed the figures for individual sections of the Defense services which are as under:

Even worse is the case of WAPDA observations where more than 24 billion rupees have been revealed as misappropriated or spent irregularly. The main projects in which these observations have been held include Greater Thal Canal Project, Ghazi Barotha Project, Khan Khwar Power Project, and others. Most shocking perhaps is the amount worth more than 18 billion rupees that was kept in banks by the power wing of WAPDA and the interest earned on it was not remitted to the government.
Given the startling amount of misappropriation and irregularity of government funds in WAPDA and Defense departments, it is manifest that our country needs to take corruption as seriously as terrorism since it is eating the country’s economy from within just like worm eats wood. Under the new government, we hope that strict penalties will be enforced on those responsible for misappropriating the nation’s wealth.





