Put on notice: Minister asked to clarify remarks in house

In response to allegations made by JUI-F senator, senate chairman issues notice to Pervaiz Rashid to appear on Monday

ISLAMABAD:

In response to allegations made by a Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) senator, Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani on Friday issued a notice to Federal Information Minister Pervaiz Rashid to appear in the house on Monday and clarify his position on his ‘controversial’ remarks against ‘madaris’.

As the JUI-F senator Maulana Attaur Rehman, younger brother of the party chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, started his speech against the federal minister and also questioned his credentials as a true Muslim, Raza Rabbani interrupted the religious leader, saying it would be better to make a statement in the presence of Senator Pervaiz Rashid.

“This is as per parliamentary norms and rules that first we have to issue notice to the relevant member of the house and then give any statement about him,” observed the chairman Senate.

Maulana Rehman said he has no issue and will wait till Monday, to which Raza Rabbani announced issuing of a notice to Peraviz Rashid. The other member of the JUI-F would also be allowed to call explanation from the information minister.

Speaking on his calling attention notice, MQM senator Col (retd) Syed Tahir Hussain Mashhadi said discriminatory decision has been taken by the Special Committee and SSB-1 against Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS) officers belonging to the provinces of Sindh and Balochistan.

Currently, he said, there is not a single federal secretary in 39 ministries. As per the reply submitted by the government to the upper house of parliament, of these 39 grade-22 federal secretaries, 22 are from Punjab, 11 from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) and only three from Sindh, one each from Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir.

“It is stated that there are 39 posts of federal secretaries in the Federal Secretariat against which officers belonging to various departments regularly constituted Occupational Groups/Services are posted... Further, one officer namely Pir Bakhsh Khan Jamali who hails from Balochistan is posted as additional secretary (in-charge) of States and Frontier Regions Division,” the government’s reply said.

According to BNP senator Dr Jahanzeb Jamaldini, the additional secretary is toothless.

In his remarks, Raza Rabbani said this is the art of the ‘baboos’, a term used for top bureaucrats, and we cannot blame the prime minister for this.

PML-N senator Raja Zafarul Haq confessed that this is sheer discrimination and held that this is necessary to address such concerns for a strong federation. He assured that he would take up this matter with Premier Nawaz Sharif.

The opposition parties also staged a token walkout against what they considered an “under-valued sale” of Heavy Electrical Complex (HEC). The Privatisation Commission Board had approved to fix the reference price to sell the HEC at over Rs500 million, which according to senator Saifur Rehman is around 10-time lower than the fair market value of the entity.

Headed by Privatisation Commission Chairman Mohammad Zubair, the board fixed the reference price of the HEC at just Rs35.72 per share.

PPP senator Saeed Ghani, speaking on his calling attention notice, said the government decided to sell the HEC on a sole bid basis, adding that against the three pre-qualified bidders, only Cargill Holdings deposited Rs25 million as earnest money.

He termed the reply of the relevant ministry insufficient and announced token boycott from the Senate proceedings. Chairman Senate Rabbani said, “Despite that oversight is our duty, I’ll exercise maximum restraint in this issue which is also pending before a court.” The chairman asked the government to brief the house on Monday.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 16^th, 2015.