The Civil Aviation Authority of Pakistan (CAA) staff of the Benazir Bhutto International Airport BBIA)-Rawalpindi has rejected the findings of a departmental committee’s investigation into the death of two CAA firefighters in the Gakhar Plaza incident on December 20, 2008. The CAA staff said Rawalpindi Chief Fire Officer (CFO) Anwar Ahmed Ghauri was favoured in the half-hearted departmental committee investigation. They demanded Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry to constitute a judicial commission to put the people responsible behind bars. Pakistan Today was provided with documents proving Ghauri is responsible for the death of Abid Ali and Rizwanul Haq, junior firefighters of the CAA.
According to the documents, Ghauri had forced Ali and Haq to enter the burning building, despite the warning of Senior Aerodrome Fire-fighter Syed Ali Raza Rizvi. Rizvi had refused to send his team into the building burning for the past 15 hours, but Ghauri ignored all safety standards and forced Ali and Haq to enter the ramshackle building, it was learnt from the documents. The CAA had constituted a committee, comprising Lahore CFO Ishtiaq Soomro as the head and Imran Ahmed and Muhammad Musharraf as members, in February this year to investigate the death of the two firefighters.
The CAA staff said the departmental committee had favoured Ghauri and, according to the application, Soomro had said it would be difficult for him to collect witness accounts and evidence to conduct a proper inquiry.
The CAA staff also said the committee had ignored witness accounts altogether while conducting their investigation and concluded that the two firefighters were standing outside the plaza when the building collapsed.
A CAA Trade Union leader Pervez Khan Jadoon, who has forwarded the application to the CJP for conducting a judicial inquiry of the incident, said according to fire safety standards, rescue workers should not be sent inside any building that has been burning for four hours at a stretch. Jadoon said junior firefighters Ali and Haq were on duty at the BBIA when they were sent to the ill-fated Gakhar Plaza, where CFO Ghauri, despite the worsening condition of the building, ordered them to enter it.
Earlier, Ghauri had directed Senior Aerodrome Fire-fighter Rizvi to enter the plaza, but the latter refused to do so and said the building could collapse at any moment, Jadoon added.
He said, “The plaza had been burning for 15 hours straight. There was no possibility of survival of any human being inside the building, but Ghauri did not realise the gravity of the situation. He ordered the young firefighters to enter the building. He threatened to sack them if they failed to comply.”
When the CAA firefighters entered the plaza, the firefighters from the Punjab Emergency Service (Rescue 1122) and Civil Defence-Islamabad followed them, but the building collapsed a few moments later, he added.
Jadoon said, “Ghauri is responsible for the death of the two firefighters. We are trained to douse blazing planes, not buildings. The CAA is assigned to provide logistic support, not take part in dousing fires.”
In his statement on a stamp paper, Senior Aerodrome Fire-fighter Rizvi said Ghauri is responsible for the death of the two young firefighters.
Rizvi said utilising his expertise, he had warned Ghauri several times, but he did not listen and ordered the firefighters to enter the dangerous building.
A witness, Muhammad Riaz, who has also recorded his statement on a stamp paper, said Ghauri had tried to bribe him for changing his statement, but he refused all his offers.
“I am prepared to state what I witnessed whenever and wherever I am asked to. Ghauri had forced me to say that the two firefighters were standing outside the building when it collapsed,” he added.
When Ghauri was contacted, he said, “Eleven other firefighters were also killed in the Gakhar Plaza incident. Why are you people not writing about them and only giving attention to two CAA firefighters?”
He said the departmental committee had concluded that the two firefighters were standing outside the plaza when it collapsed.
He rejected the claims of the CAA staff and said he had not forced any fire-fighter to enter the building.
He said some members of the CAA staff were hatching conspiracies against him and trying to remove him from his office.
