KP Billion Tree Tsunami: Legal action against 145 officials for alleged massive corruption

PESHAWAR: Corruption of millions of rupees surfaced in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government’s Billion Tree Tsunami initiative, which involves increasing the number of trees both by planting and natural regeneration.

An investigation within the government departments revealed that 145 officers of the KP forest division were found involved in corruption.

Legal action was taken against those 145 officers, whereas, 44 officials were forcefully retired due to misappropriation of funds and other reasons.

The officials belonged to Peshawar, Kohat, Bannu, Mardan and DI Khan, according to documents. 

Currently, an inquiry against the forest division’s 19 employees is under way for dereliction of duty and financial irregularities in the project.

Those under investigation include the forest conservator, two divisional and three sub-divisional officers.

Moreover, 60 officers of the forest division were also suspended.

The KP government had said that in the project no kind of corruption will be tolerated. 

Billion Tree Tsunami aims to turn around deforestation and increase the province’s forested area by at least two per cent. 

About 40 per cent of the country’s remaining forests are in KP province. 

The Imran Khan and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf-backed tree planting effort is expected to hit its billion-tree goal by the end of this year.