Big guns eye top slots for kin in foreign missions

Close relatives of the Balochistan governor and chief minister are frontrunners in the race to get lucrative post of community welfare attaché in Pakistani missions abroad as around 14 incumbent attaches are nearing completion of their three-year posting tenure in next few months.
A source in the Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis, which selects community welfare attaches, told Pakistan Today that Prime Minister’s Secretariat had recommended the names of two close relatives of Balochistan Governor Zulfiqar Ali Magsi and Balochistan Chief Minister Nawab Aslam Raisani to Overseas Pakistanis Ministry Secretary KB Rind for selection as community welfare attaches for upcoming postings. “The PM Secretariat has also recommended the name of one Lubna Sarwar for the post,” the source said, adding that as the tenure of a dozen of attaches was going to be completed in next few months, a race had begun among influential government servants and the relatives of leading politicians to secure the lucrative slot.
It is pertinent to mention here that it will not be for the first time that any close relative of top government functionary would be appointed on lucrative slot as formerly the PPP government appointed Shahnaz Mazhar, wife of Sindh senior minister Pir Mazhar-ul-Haq, on Dec 28, 2008 as a community welfare attaché with the diplomatic status of a Counsellor in London and the date of completion of her tenure is Dec 27, 2011. The source said Shahnaz Mazhar would be most likely given extension in posting on completion of her tenure. “The Establishment Division too has short-listed names of around 98 applicants from civil service while their names would be finalised by the PM and some of them by dysfunctional minister Farooq Sattar, who despite tendering resignation from the minister-ship is still controlling all the affairs of the Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis,” said the source. The source said the ministry would conduct interviews of short-listed candidates shortly.