Scamming the state: PSO uncovers seven bogus degree holders, sacks five

Two cases pending; four from OGDCL, two from OGRA also found with fake degrees.

ISLAMABAD:

The fake degree phenomenon is not restricted only to politicians – officials from public sector organisations have also been long serving with bogus credentials.

State-owned petroleum enterprise Pakistan State Oil (PSO) has discovered that seven of its employees possessed bogus degrees.

Sources told The Express Tribune that PSO’s management indentified seven officials who were appointed on fake degrees, and had been serving the organisation for a long period of time.

“Seven [such] cases have been identified and action in accordance with the law has already been taken against them by PSO’s management,” the organisation’s spokesman said, adding that “five employees have already been dismissed, while the fate of the remaining two cases is soon to be decided.”

According to an official of the petroleum ministry, PSO’s management had been directed to verify the degrees of its employees after the ministry received complaints of the cases.



The petroleum ministry, according to this official, was informed that some high-level officials from PSO also have fake degrees and had been performing their respective jobs for decades.

Sources in PSO, however, denied this particular claim saying: “We have not found any case wherein senior officials work on fake degrees. However, seven junior officers have been found in this regard.”

They added that the verification of the degrees was a part of the human resource policy formulated by the petroleum ministry.



Apart from PSO, Oil and Gas Development Company Limited (OGDCL) found four employees who has falsified their academic qualifications. These employees were terminated after an inquiry by OGDCL management.

Two cases of falsified degrees were also reported from the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra). Former Chairman Ogra Tauqeer Sadiq was one such official, as his LLM was declared fake by the Higher Education Commission (HEC).

Furthermore, Ogra office secretary Anwar Khan’s degree was also proved to be bogus by the administration.

When contacted, Ogra spokesman confirmed that Khan’s degree had proven to be fake, and that he had left his job. He added that some of the officials’ degrees had been verified, while the remaining ones were under scrutiny by universities.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 9^th, 2012.