SC directs govt to appoint heads of 50 governmental bodies by year-end

SC registrar office sends reminder to AGP to immediately report on level of progress achieved on Nov 14 verdict


Hasnaat Malik December 05, 2014

ISLAMABAD: A day after the government finally appointed a new chief election commissioner (CEC) after months of delay, the Supreme Court has directed it to appoint over 50 heads of various statutory, autonomous and regulatory bodies by the end of December.

To ensure the implementation of the November 14 verdict, the registrar office of the top court on Thursday sent a reminder to Attorney General for Pakistan (AGP) Salman Aslam Butt to immediately report on the level of progress achieved in this matter.

“The AGP office has received a reminder from Assistant Registrar Nazar Abbas, asking them to submit the report so that the registrar office can place it before the chambers for perusal,” an official from the AGP's office confirmed to The Express Tribune.

According to the list submitted by the AGP last month, 22 statutory bodies and 33 public sector companies, which were established under the Companies Ordinance, 1984, are without any heads.

Further, The Express Tribune had learnt that it would be extremely difficult to fill the vacancies by the end of this month, despite the fact that the government appointed a chairman for Nepra as a part of the recent appointments.

The court, on the request of the AGP, earlier reversed former chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry’s judgment regarding the formation of a commission for this task.

Interestingly, the former chief justice gave a verdict over the plea of PML-N senior leader Khawaja Muhammad Asif.

After a period of 17 months, the government contended, through the AGP, that the proposed commission was the main hurdle in the appointment of heads of the governmental departments.

“The verdict of June 12, 2013, should be revisited,” Butt added.

The court, while accepting the government plea, excluded the condition of the formation of a commission for top-level appointments.

The judgment – authored by Justice Ijaz Ahmed Chaudhry – said that the Supreme Court’s June 2013 ruling had overlooked the provisions of Article 90 of the Constitution.

The court had observed in its verdict that there were no impediments in the process of appointments, and that they should be filled up without loss of time by the end of December, 2014.

“A preliminary report on the progress made towards the appointment shall be submitted by the learned Attorney General for Pakistan for our perusal in chambers by the 10th of December, 2014," the judgment of the top court said.

The judgment also suggested that the government may consider the establishment of such a commission through legislation in order to ensure transparency — which would also enable the executive authority to make an informed decision while making appointments.

It added that it was a settled law that the courts should ordinarily refrain from interfering in the policy-making domain of the executive.

The top court on Wednesday also issued notices to Salman Butt over the legal status of organisational heads appointed by the commission.

The commission had appointed Pakistan Telecommunication Authority Member Technical, Member Finance (ii) Pakistan Television Corporation MD and Pakistan Steel Mills Limited chairman.

COMMENTS (4)

S.R.H. Hashmi | 9 years ago | Reply

Our hard-working PML-N government, and the equally devoted opposition, just managed to appoint a Chief Election Commissioner. After this strenuous exercise, which they had to continue for sixteen months, they would naturally have been entitled to a well-earned rest, perhaps in a foreign country. However, instead of appreciating the move and saluting the government and opposition on their spectacular achievement, Supreme Court has started hammering the government to hurry up with the appointment of heads for over fifty statutory, autonomous and regulatory bodies which have been operating in a headless condition for over a year. And what is worse is that instead of giving a few decades that would be required to raise the required number of people within the Sharif dynasty, the Supreme Court has given them only until the end of this month to complete this massive operation.

Just shows how unreasonable some people can be

Karachi

Shuaib | 9 years ago | Reply

The SC should take national interest into account and wait until the next senate is in!! We are a nation which can not have PPP decide anything. I believe the PMLN and PTI duo will be much better for uss!!

The SC should ignore this for the sake our prosperity.

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