KARACHI – A t least 54 vacancies in the Sindh Tourism Department are unoccupied for over a year now due to disagreements between PPP and its coalition partner MQM over job quotas in government departments.
Reliable sources told Pakistan Today that applications were invited by the Tourism Department last year and a large number of youth had applied for the vacancies, however, the department could not conduct the interviews of the short-listed candidates due to political interference during the recruitment process.
The candidates who had applied for the vacant positions are repeatedly contacting the higher authorities but to no avail.
Moreover, the post of GHDA director general is also lying vacant after completion of the contract extension of ex-director general Abdul Qadir Mangi.
In January 2010, the Tourism Department had invited job applications for vacancies in the Gorakh Hill Development Authority (GHDA) including three assistant computer operators (BPS-12), two accounts clerks (BPS-11), two stenographers (BPS-11), six junior clerks (BPS-7), five drivers (BPS-5), 12 attendants/peons (BPS-12), one electrician (BPS-1), one plumber (BPS-1), 14 security guards (BPS-2) and seven pump operators (BPS-2). The last date for submission of applications was stated as February 15, 2010, but the department did not make any further progress to complete the process.
The said vacancies were announced during the tenure of PPP’s former tourism minister Shazia Marri but the minister was removed and was allotted the portfolio of Electric Power due to the reconciliatory politics formula being followed in the country particularly in Sindh.
Later, the tourism portfolio went to PML-F leader Imtiaz Sheikh but he was removed along with some 11 advisers to the chief minister in a move to lower government expenditures under the 18th Constitutional Amendment. The tourism portfolio was then allotted to the Law and Parliamentary Affairs minister.
The GDHA was established for the development of a hill station at Gorakh Hill, which is located at an elevation of 5,688 ft (1,734 m) in the Kirthar mountain ranges mountain ranges, 93 km northwest of Dadu.
The sources added that the PPP and the MQM have agreed over the job quota issue and it is expected that the vacancies would be filled in August or September 2011.
