Favouritism disregarded: Top court grills NEPRA for not appointing permanent head

ISLAMABAD:

The Supreme Court, while hearing a case related to the recent increase in power tariff, has expressed anger over the federal government for not appointing a permanent chairman of National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) and running it on ad hoc basis.

A three-member SC bench led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry heard the case on Thursday, where the petitioner disclosed that Khawaja Naeem is working as acting chairman Nepra and not as a permanent head of the institution responsible for regulating electricity in Pakistan.

This fact triggered a new debate as court inquired about the legal standing of acting chairman. “How an acting Nepra chief can take decisions?” the chief justice questioned. “It’s unperceivable why the state institutions are being run on ad hoc basis. The attorney general must respond to it. If everything is to be run by the court then what the government is meant for?”



“Everything is being run through nepotism and junior officers are being appointed on key posts”, the chief justice asserted. The top judge further said the government promulgated the Protection of Pakistan Ordinance in 24 hours, but no legislation was done about Federal Service Tribunal and the tribunal had been lying ineffective since 2012.

Justice Jawwad S Khawaja pointed out that acting chairmen were looking after the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority and the Pakistan International Airlines, now it has been disclosed that Nepra is also performing its function under an ‘acting chairman’.

Justice Chaudhry also said if the federal government had not agreed with the apex court’s judgment in Khawaja Asif petition, then it should have filed a review petition in this regard. The Attorney General Muneer A Malik confessed that after the apex court’s judgment in Khawaja Asif case, several departments are still running headless.

The complainant made another disclosure that Khawaja Naeem is relative of Minister for Water and Power Khawaja Asif, to which, the chief justice remarked that the tradition of favouritism in high-level appointments is still alive.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 8^th, 2013.