Cabinet okays outsourcing of services at key airports

Disregard of on-going litigation in the matter stuns observers

ISLAMABAD: The federal cabinet’s disregard of a litigation as it pressed ahead with the controversial outsourcing of ‘management and maintenance’ services at three major airports —Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad — stunned many observers.

The employees of the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) had filed a case in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) against outsourcing and privatisation of airports.

The case will next be heard on April 18.

The cabinet, which met under Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Wednesday, went ahead and approved the outsourcing of various services at the Jinnah International Airport, Karachi, Allama Iqbal International Airport, Lahore, and New Islamabad International Airport (which is not operational yet).



Interestingly, the outsourcing was not part of the agenda of the cabinet meeting, the official press release issued by the PM House showed.

However, details of this decision were provided by the Information Minister of State, Marriyum Aurangzeb, announced in a press briefing.

Officials feared ‘foul play’ in the government’s policy towards the outsourcing move.

“They (cabinet members) acted in haste,” commented a senior government functionary.

“At a time when IHC is hearing an important case on this particular issue, approving a controversial agenda item means something is fishy.”



The reason behind the haste, insiders believed, was that some powerful individuals involved in commercial aviation, who enjoyed close ties with the ruling elite, were likely to be accommodated with the award of related contracts in this regard.

Reports also suggested that Chinese, Turkish and Qatari companies had also expressed keen interest in management of airports.

Constitutional expert Kunwar Dilshad said that there were several Supreme Court decisions that barred the executive from taking decisions on crucial matters on which cases are still pending in superior.

“In this case, the Executive approved something that is pending with the IHC. This runs against the respect and privilege of the court,” he said.

On February 7, the government ran an advertisement, inviting applications/ proposals from international companies to ‘privatise’ New Islamabad International Airport, Allama Iqbal International Airport, Lahore, and Jinnah International Airport, Karachi.

The last date for submission of applications/ proposals was March 25. The advertisement stated that the companies desirous of participating in the process shall be responsible for operation, management and development works.

This move was opposed by the CAA employees who organised protests at several airports across the country.

Subsequently, the government retracted the advertisement and extended the cut-off date for submissions of applications by two months.



This also points towards violation of rules, sources said.

In March, the CAA employees, including representatives of Employees Unity of Civil Aviation Authority (EUCAA), moved the IHC against “the … shocking news concerning privatisation of three major airports where major part of the workforce of CAA is deployed created a serious sense of insecurity among thousands of employees. All of them were surprised that as to why major components of a profit yielding organization of Government of Pakistan are being privatized. The financial performance report of CAA relating to the year 2015-2016 reflects that the CAA earned more than 50 billion rupees during the said year”.

PM’s Adviser Ameer Muqam said that government had great respect for the judiciary.

“If any case is pending — as you say — but I didn’t know — things will be done in compliance with the IHC orders,” he said. He did not elaborate.

President of the Islamabad chapter of the EUCAA Asif Iqbal, who is also one of the petitioners in the case, refused to comment on the issue, terming the matter sub judice.