Increase in salary of govt employees in the doldrums

| Khaleeq Kiani | 1st December, 2012

ISLAMABAD, Nov 30: An initiative by the federal government to increase salaries of civil servants before coming elections is unlikely to materialise owing to opposition from provincial governments which want increased expenditure on public welfare schemes to woo the larger number of voters, instead of permanently increasing their salary budgets.

A senior government official told Dawn on Friday that the pay and pension committee headed by former governor of State Bank Dr Ishrat Hussain had asked the regulation wing of the ministry of finance to work out a salary adjustment formula with ‘zero budgetary impact’ through merger of allowances in the basic salary and rationalisation of double and triple salaries being paid to officers working at influential institutions.

Dr Hussain had also asked provincial chief secretaries to take up the matter with chief ministers and come up with their written responses over rationalisation of salary structures at the next meeting of the commission. The commission had proposed reducing the percentage of pension being paid to retired officers to contain the pension budget.

The official said the meeting of the pay and pension commission which was originally planned soon after Eidul Azha has not taken place because of delays by the finance ministry’s regulation wing to finalise its recommendations and then non-availability of Dr Hussain due to his engagements abroad. The regulation wing had, however, indicated that salary increases through the merger of allowance was not possible without budgetary impact.

The commission has also been informed that double and triple salaries being paid to officers working in specialised institutions like the President and Prime Minister Secretariats and Federal Board of Revenue could not be withdrawn because of a Supreme Court judgement under which a monetary benefit once legally provided to government servants could not be withdrawn.

Therefore, the only option to provide equitable remuneration benefits to all was to increase salaries of other government servants, even if it was through merger of allowance in basic salary which could not be done without additional budgetary impact.

Officials said that even though formal provincial responses would be available at the next meeting of the commission expected in the second week of December, the feedback from almost all provincial governments was not encouraging. Except for Sindh’s flexible mood, all three provincial governments have opposed it.

Punjab, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were of the view that the federal government had already eroded their fiscal space because of additional transfers out of federal divisible pool by increasing salaries by over 135 per cent in four years. The provinces have also reported that additional benefits to government employees could not be provided without substantially increasing salary budgets.

For instance, a one per cent increase in salary meant Rs35 billion additional impact for the federal government, Rs70 billion for Punjab and Rs70 billion for three other provinces put together.

DAWN

Retired civil servants


ISLAMABAD: According to reports, a bench of the Supreme Court has ordered the Establishment Division to furnish a list of retired civil servants who have been re-employed by the government after reaching the age of retirement. In Pakistan, the age of superannuation stipulated in the Civil Servants Act 1973 is 60 years. It means that a civil servant who has completed 60 years of his recorded age cannot continue in the service of Pakistan, in terms of Section 14 of the Civil Servants Act. However, this rule is blatantly violated in practice. Favoured retired civil servants and army officers are appointed in various government organisations without regard to this rule. The most sought-after positions are in the Prime Mininster’s Inspection Commission (PMIC), the Federal Public Service Commission, the Provincial Public Service Commissions and the Federal Service Tribunal. It may be interesting to note that the chairman of NAB, as well as that of the PMIC, are well past the age of retirement.
It is an open secret that these appointments are made on political and personal considerations. Many federal secretaries manipulate prestigious and lucrative appointments after retirement. These appointments not only breed frustration in the civil service but if we want rule of law and good governance in the country, only merit must prevail. There is also urgent need to evolve an oversight mechanism for monitoring crucial and strategic appointments in the government organisations.
Asghar Mahmood
Published in The Express Tribune, December 11th, 2012.

Bureaucratic manoeuvring: How to accommodate an over-aged functionary


By Shahbaz Rana
ISLAMABAD:

The Planning Commission is considering extending a project worth Rs144.2 million for a second time, aimed to continue accommodating an official who has crossed the retirement age and is facing an inquiry ordered by the Prime Minister’s Secretariat on the same grounds.

The Institutional Strengthening and Efficiency Enhancement Project’s first extension lapsed in September 2012, but officials involved with the project are still being paid salaries from taxpayer money. According to the Planning Commission documents, Rs3.2 million has been released for the project, out of Rs18 million earmarked for it for the current fiscal year.


A Planning Commission spokesman confirmed the project expired in September 2012, and a proposal to extend the project till June 2013 was under consideration. He said that no decision has been taken regarding the new extension, while the government is continuing to bear the cost of the salaries of less than a dozen officials, hired against the project. The spokesman also confirmed that serious work on the project had stalled.
The project was originally planned till June 2014, but in a rationalisation exercise, it was listed as an expendable project. It was among 14 other projects which were abandoned to save Rs25 billion. The projects were initiated in the name of capacity building, but the real motive was to accommodate retired bureaucrats, said an official of the Planning Commission.
According to the Public Sector Development Programmes’ document, Rs67.8 million was spent on the project up to June 2012, compared to the total cost of Rs144.2 million. Had the decision to abandon it been upheld, Rs76.4 million in taxpayers money would have been saved.


PM’s Secretariat seeks explanation


The proposal to extend the Institutional Strengthening and Efficiency Enhancement Project has been initiated despite the fact that the Prime Minister’s Secretariat sought an explanation from the Planning Commission in June 2012 for retaining an official who is over 65-years-old, which is the maximum age limit for a contractual job after an official reaches the superannuation age of 60.
After a media report highlighted the irregularity, the Secretariat raised its objections, and the commissions’ secretary at the time, Asif Bajwa, had constituted an inquiry committee and interestingly the official at the centre of the irregularity, Asif Sheikh, was also a member of the committee.
According to an official of the Administration Wing of the Planning Commission who is dealing with the matter, the inquiry has not yet been concluded and certain clarifications have been sought from the Establishment Division. He said that after the Establishment Division’s response, the Planning Commission would give its response to the Secretariat’s objections.
When approached by The Express Tribune for comment, Sheikh said he did not have any idea about the status of the project.
Sources said that there was a possibility the commission could extend the project as Sheikh was not only relying on bureaucrats but also using his political connections.
In 2007, the project had been designed to retain Sheikh in the commission, even after his retirement, according to the officials.
In June 2012, the PC had made a plea that the government wanted to gradually close down the project to give a chance to the officials to find new jobs.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 1st, 2012.

KPK cabinet approves old LB system

December 12, 2012 - Updated 1535 PKT
From Web Edition

PESHAWAR: Khyber Pukhtunkhwa provincial cabinet has approved the restoration of the old local bodies system in the province on Wednesday here, Geo News reported.

Reintroduction of municipal corporations and zila councils and the independent office of deputy commissioner are the central points of the approved local government system.

This would replace the local government system which was introduced by Gen. Musharraf.

It will end the office of DCO which used to function under elected district nazims and reintroduce the provincially controlled office of the deputy commissioner.

Source: The News

__________________
Muhammad Ali Asghar

Rehiring civil servants


ACCORDING to media reports, a bench of the Supreme Court ordered the establishment division to furnish a list of retired civil servants who have been reemployed by the government after their superannuation.
In Pakistan, the age of superannuation stipulated in the Civil Servants Act 1973 is 60 years. It means that a civil servant who has completed 60 years of his recorded age cannot continue the service of Pakistan, in terms of section 14 of the Civil Servants Act.
However, this rule is blatantly violated in practice. Favourite retired civil servants and army officers are appointed in various organisations under the control of the government generously without regard to established norms, rules and laws.
The most-sought-after positions are in the Prime Minister’s Inspection Commission (PMIC), the Federal Public Service Commission (FPSC), provincial public service commissions, Federal Service Tribunal (FST), provincial services tribunals, Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP), regulatory authorities, the National School of Public Policy, the national institutes of management, PIA, Pakistan Steel Mills, Karachi Port Trust, Planning Commission of Pakistan, etc.
It may be interesting to note that the NAB chairman, PMIC chairman and secretary/chief executive of the BISP are in their late 70s and 80s. They are holding positions concerned with the affairs of the federal government, thus in violation of the provisions of the law.
There is no secret about it that these appointments are made on political and personal considerations without regard to merit and law. Many federal secretaries manipulate prestigious and lucrative appointments after retirement.
These appointments not only breed frustration in the civil service but also are against Article 25 of the Constitution. This is also the context of the petition of Khushdil Khan, who has been relocated from the interior division.
If we want rule of law and good governance in the country, merit and only merit must prevail in appointments and promotions. There is also an urgent need to evolve an oversight mechanism for monitoring crucial and strategic appointments in government organisations.
ASGHAR MAHMOOD
Islamabad


DAWN

Appointments in the police

SHIKARPUR: The Sindh Public Service Commission (SPSC) is tasked to receive applications and conduct examinations in a transparent and impartial manner and select candidates for the civil service, including the police. It also announced 700 vacancies of assistant sub-inspectors (ASI) in Grade 9, in June 2011, under the Police Order of 2002. Of these, 334 vacancies were to be filled from among head constables or police constables already in service and who were graduates.
Thousands of candidates submitted applications in this regard along with a fee of Rs500. In October of this year, call letters were issued only to the police personnel for examination to be conducted by the SPSC. The letters had hardly been issued when it was announced through the official website that the offer of vacant posts was being withdrawn!
The same posts were again announced through a Sindhi newspaper advertisement on December 8. In this, no seats were set aside for head constables or constables. The advertisement also said that the recruitment process would be conducted by the home department and not the SPSC. Changing the selection process from the SPSC — which has a good reputation — to the home department can often mean political interference.
It is ironic that at a time when the province’s law and order situation is going from bad to worse, there should be these kinds of shenanigans and that, too, in a department as crucial to fight crime as the police. I request the Sindh government to assign the selection process of ASIs to the SPSC so that the appointments can be done on merit and not on a political basis.
AB Noonari
Published in The Express Tribune, December 14th, 2012.

Ombudsmen and their utility


ACCORDING to reports (Nov 19), the post of Federal Ombudsman has been lying vacant for the last two years despite directives of the Supreme Court a year ago.
During these three months, much has appeared in the press trying to give an impression as if due to this ‘adl-i-Jahangri’ has stopped.
The ombudsmen system in Pakistan has been working for the last 28 years and under new labels, new offices keep coming like banking ombudsman, insurance ombudsman, women ombudsman, and regional offices in the name of public convenience, etc.
But what has this system produced? For example, I brought to the notice of the insurance ombudsman the plight of two illiterate labourers: one of them having returned from what virtually was the deathbed. The SLIC did not give then any response, not to speak of compensating them for their disability under their insurance policies.
The insurance ombudsman told me the State Life and NLIC were not under his jurisdiction. If the country’s biggest insurance company was not under the insurance ombudsman, then what his huge costly office was dealing with?
What has this debt-ridden nation thus got in proportion to the huge annual expense it is bearing to keep this system alive? The system was not established to deliver individual relief to those who cried but for putting the derailed system back on track. But the ombudsman system has failed to deliver.
About three years ago, I submitted a human rights petition that this system may be ‘de-established’. This way colossal money could be saved and diverted to the Human Rights Cell of the Supreme Court where it could be spent much better on issues collectively benefiting the community. The Federal Ombudsman opened its first regional office in Karachi in a residential bungalow in violation of civic rules.
Officials in the Federal Ombudsman, Islamabad, according to reports, say the contact staff hired at ‘high posts’ are working without salaries as their contracts are renewable but only by an appointed ombudsman.
I believe that a fixed period contract automatically stands expired on the last day of its maturity unless renewed. When any contract, in this case an employment contract, gets expired on the last date, the employee named therein does not remain a legal valid employee.
None except the authority competent to approve such a contract or employment — in this case it is none other than the ombudsman himself — has the legal authority to verbally or otherwise direct or allow such a person (now an ex-employee) to continue working, nor has such an employee the right to attend to the work and sit in the office even on a so-called without pay basis.
This is a technique to keep the said ex-employee to be paid through a back-dated contract renewal when a competent authority in future is available. The Supreme Court last year ordered the stopping of extensions and re-employments.
Those whose contracts expired for want of renewals are re-employed in this august office as their function is obedience to law and checking the disobedience to law by others.
In the late 1970s, I was working for a very big autonomous body. The company was running losses and each month the salary was being paid through overdraft. I wished to go abroad but many attempts failed to get my resignation accepted as I was told my services were badly needed for the organisation. I felt myself so important and indispensable.
Finally, I was able to leave the organisation and went abroad. A year or two later, a news item passed through my eyes wherein the company had practically entered the export market and had given a bonus to the staff.
I felt that it was my work that was causing losses to the company and as soon as I quit the job, the company started working all right, paying salaries/bonuses from its own earnings.
Is there any institution, except the Supreme Court, which really follows the procedures and rules in these days of ‘degree is degree’?


JAVED
Karachi
DAWN

Pension: government order


THIS is apropos of the letters entitled ‘Court judgment of pension’ and ‘Why the discrimination’ ( Nov 4 and Dec 5) respectively by A. Raoof and Chowdhury Walidad. Both are concerned with the procurement of financial benefits on the commuted pension (50 per cent part of the total pension). The pension commutation system was introduced for both federal and provincial government employees.
It operated until 2001 when it was abolished. We know that the retirement age of government servants is 60 years and the commutation of half of the pension was for a period of 15 years. It, therefore, required a minimum of 75 years of age for the entitlement of benefits of the commuted pension. To guide the readers, a few more references related to the case include: (1). Federal Service Tribunal judgment 15.12.2011, (2) pension case — Nawa-i-Waqt, Lahore — 25.4.2012, (3) review petition filed by the attorney general — 26.5.2012.
All the petitions concerning the case were based on the plea that the pensioners received increments from time to time on the 50 per cent of the non-commuted money though it remained in total custody of the government for as long as 15 years.
The commuted and non-commuted pension money which comes to 50:50 per cent must have been given equal benefits. Logically, this would entitle the government pensioners to ‘cumulative pension’ which would come to almost the double of their existing pension.
According to references quoted above, the Lahore High Court, as well as the Supreme Court, has clearly issued orders for paying the ‘cumulative pension’ to the aged retired government employees.
In this connection Justice Khan of the Lahore High Court had ordered the Special Secretary, Finance, of Punjab to pay government pensioners complete amount of the ‘cumulative pension’ and submit the report before the court by Sept 27, 2012.
It has come to the notice of pensioners that the ‘cumulative pension’, which comes to almost double of the existing pension, is already being paid to a number of retired government officers. It is, therefore, requested that the federal government may kindly issue clear orders regarding the implementation of the ‘cumulative pension’ so that delays, anomalies and injustices may be avoided. This would ensure a fair play and further strengthen confidence in the present government.
Lastly, Pakistan Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, as well as heads of the concerned ministry, is requested to help the pensioners in the uniform implementation of the court judgments for the payment of ‘cumulative pension’ without further delays.
DR S. IFTIKHAR AHMED
Karachi

DAWN

Appointment of ASIs: a plea


THE Sindh Public Service Commission is tasked by the government to receive applications, conduct examinations in a transparent and impartial manner and select the most suitable candidates for jobs.
It also announced 700 vacancies of assistant sub-inspectors BPS-9 in June 2011 under Police Order 2002 Article 7 (3), out of which 334 vacancies were reserved to be filled from amongst graduate head constables/police constables of the Police Department.
Thousands of candidates meeting the criteria set by the commission not only submitted applications, coupled with deposited challan of Rs500 as an application process fee, but also bore other consequential expenditure in this regard.
In October 2012 written call letters were issued only to the police personnel for examination to be conducted by the SPSC.
The letters had hardly been issued when it announced through its official website the withdrawal of posts at the behest of additional chief secretary, Home Department, and government of Sindh.
The same posts were again announced through a Sindhi newspaper on Dec 8 by spurning seats reserved for head constable/constable. The advertisement also stipulated that the recruitment process will completely be made by the department concerned. Changing the selection process from the SPSC — the professional institution in question — to the department can facilitate political involvement in subsequent appointment at the expense of eligible candidates.
It is a proverbial fact that the entire police department is littered with political involvement which had also influenced the selection process of ASIs conducted by the department in the late 1980s and 1990s.
Even most of the transfers and postings right from ASIs to the seniormost officer have political underpinning. With regard to the fresh appointments, Wajid Ali Durani, the former IGP, Sindh, also admitted in September last year before the Supreme Court that almost all the appointments in the police department were made on a political basis.
The law and order situation in Sindh, including Karachi, is spinning from bad to worse with each receding day, which strangles socioeconomic development in the province. Depoliticisation of the department is one of the most effective catalysts for improving the deteriorating situation.
I request the authorities concerned to assign the process of selection of ASIs to the SPSC or the National Testing System so that the department could be guarded against political involvement and eligible candidates could be appointed.
A. B. NOONARI
Shikarpur


DAWN

Re-employing retired civil servants


KARACHI: On December 7, the Supreme Court had directed the federal government to furnish a list of retired civil servants who had been re-employed.