Harassment charge haunts ‘CIA collaborator’
With a high treason case already registered against him, the doctor who allegedly assisted American intelligence agencies in tracking down Bin Laden and his family in Abbottabad through a ‘fake vaccination camp’, is also facing a harassment charge that has been pending in the Supreme Court (SC) for some time now.
Documents available with The Express Tribune titled: Enquiry Report: Harassment of Female Nurse Khyber Agency, reveal that complainant Sania Bakht filed a harassment charge against Dr Shakil Afridi, then Khyber Agency surgeon, when he told her to tend to a patient in the male ward with injuries on his genitals.
The record reveals that Sania was on duty in the female ward but Dr Afridi, despite being informed by the other staff that a male doctor
had already seen the patient, insisted that Sania tend to him.
After going through relevant evidence, the inquiry committee recommended sending Dr Afridi out of the agency, and transferred him to the directorate of health services (Fata) instead.
Following the episode, Dr Afridi sought a departmental appeal against his transfer, saying the action was “politically motivated by Muhammad Nawaz Khan”, Pakistan Peoples Party agency president “and Hameedullah Jan”, then minister for environment. His appeal was rejected, following which Dr Afridi took the case to the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) service tribunal which concluded that the “transfer is not a punishment” and that the respondent department may continue the inquiry in accordance with the law and “if found guilty, the department may award proper punishment”.
As a result, the Fata Secretariat filed a civil petition in the apex court against the judgment of the K-P service tribunal, but issued a notification on April 13, 2011 to reappoint Dr Afridi as the Khyber Agency surgeon in compliance with the decision of the K-P service tribunal - exactly 29 days before Osama bin Laden was killed in a covert operation by the US Navy SEALs on May 2 in Abbottabad.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 12th, 2011.
COMMENTS (3)
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Exactly what is the crime of this Doctor?
He organized door to door polio vaccine campaign.
He very well might have vaccinated the children of the ill fated compound. So what ?
DNA of OBL and his childten? Pick through the garbage and you get ton of it of every member of household.
What the PAK people fail to ask are these. Who attended the child brith and post child birth medical needs of OBL women and where.
Who was the barber of OBL. Who was the vegetable vendor. Who was the courier for day to day activities. Who washed his clothes.
How he actually came there- certainly he did not walk there.
US raid is the least of the problem for PAK in this quagmire.
What people fail to understand is how one performs his duty is most important; not just the end result. Most Pakistanis say good riddance to OBL as well as all the other foreign criminals who have been causing unrest in the country. However, Pakistan is a sovereign nation. Dr. Afridi should have been working with the Pakistani authorities to expose and capture OBL or any other criminal- not with a foreign government behind Pakistan's back. Especially of the US was supposed to be our partner and work together with us. Imagine if the US let a foreign intelligence agency work secretly in its land without its knowledge and US citizens were helping the foreign agency instead of helping the US authorities- even to track down criminals. This is the crux of the issue. Most people anywhere in the world would say that Dr. Afridi is guilty of treason.
Dr Afridi may not be acting alone.All those involved must be exposed and appropriate action taken.