Jumping the gun: NSCC endorses choice of 40 development fellows

Only one federal secretary attended the meeting.

ISLAMABAD:

The federal government on Friday won the National Steering and Coordination Committee’s endorsement for 40 young graduates who had already been chosen for a five-year development fellowship programme in violation of laid down procedures.

Their selection came before the National Steering and Coordination Committee (NSCC) could convene its first meeting.

According to the planning ministry’s documents, the NSCC was responsible for “conducting interviews and selecting the participants of Young Development Fellows on merit”. But the ministry performed this task much before and on Friday simply presented the list of the selected fellows to the NSCC for its approval.

The selected candidates will receive a stipend of Rs60,000 per month. Taxpayers will bear the cost of the Rs261 million programme.

The committee approved the selection of Young Development Fellows and appreciated the quality of selected fellows, according to a statement, issued by the planning ministry after the first meeting of the NSCC.

However, according to a member of the NSCC who did not attend the first meeting, the ministry did not have the authority to select people without determining the committee’s selection parameters.

The first meeting of the NSCC was chaired by Ahsan Iqbal, the federal minister for Planning, Development and reforms. The committee members are Planning Secretary Hasan Nawaz Tarar, Finance Secretary Dr Waqar Masood, Economic Affairs Division Secretary Nargis Sethi and Commerce Secretary Qasim Niaz. The other members include Vice Chancellor of Pakistan Institute of Development Economics Dr Muslehud Din, Rector National School of Public Policy Ismail Qureshi and Dr Ishrat Hussain, former governor of the State Bank of Pakistan.

However, except Tarar no federal secretary attended the meeting and they sent their representatives. Dr Ishrat too did not attend the meeting while Ismail Qureshi also sent Dean of National School of Public Policy to attend the meeting.

According to ministry’s statement, the first batch of fellows comprises a very talented pool. The statement added Planning Secretary Hassan Nawaz Tarar made a presentation on various aspects of the recruitment process of the young development fellows.

The members recommended that the scope of the programme should be expanded, so that other ministries could also benefit, according to the handout.

The rector of the National University of Science and Technology (NUST) said that NUST provided free of charge service as an independent third party for short listing the candidates for this programme. Naeem Aslam, dean at the National School of Public Policy (NSPP), was of the view that the selection process was transparent, according to the handout.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2013.