In limbo: K-P Ehtesab Commission employees fret over lost jobs

PHC adjourns case indefinitely after being told no final decision made on closure

PESHAWAR: After the incumbent government hinted at shutting down the much-trumpeted provincial accountability watchdog, its employees have gone to court urging it to direct the government to adjust them in other departments or reverse decision about shutting down so that they can remain employed.

While briefing the media about the first meeting of the new provincial cabinet on September 5, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Government Spokesperson Shaukat Yousufzai had announced that the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) government had decided to shut the K-P Ehtesab Commission.

The commission’s employee Saifullah Khan and others had subsequently filed a petition before the Peshawar High Court (PHC), through their lawyer Arif Yousafzai, asking the court to retain their employment.

Saifullah and other employees had contended that they are clueless about their future after the K-P government decided to abolish the commission. They added that they had served in the commission for four years but their services had yet to be regularised. Hence there was uncertainty amongst the employees about their future.

In its last hearing of the case, the court had issued notices to the provincial government to submit a response. When a two-judge bench of the PHC, headed by Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan, took up the case on Thursday, it was found that the government had yet to submit a response to the court.

Additional Advocate General told the court that they do not have any information whether the government has taken a formal decision to roll back the commission or not?

The court noted that since the government has yet to adopt a clear stance regarding the future of the commission, nor has the government submitted any response on the matter to the court, therefore, they will wait until the government announces a clear-cut policy regarding the commission.

Moreover, since the employees are still working in the commission and are being paid, the case has been adjourned until such a time the government announces a clear policy about the fate of the commission.

During his news briefing two months ago, Yousafzai had said that the commission would be closed forthwith.

Yousufzai detailed that the K-P law department will be preparing a procedure to decide the fate of cases and references pending with the provincial accountability body.

“It did its job,” Yousufzai insisted, adding that the parallel body had been set up since the federal anti-corruption watchdog, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), was not answerable to it in the past.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 16^th, 2018.