The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Friday partially lifted the ban on recruitments and allowed the concerned departments to fill the vacancies which were advertised on or before August 31, 2012. Constitutional institutions like Supreme Court, the high courts, district courts and provincial assembles are exempt from the ban.
According to a directive issued by the ECP said that the development projects already in progress may continue without interruption where no diversion of funds is required. Furthermore, the ECP said that all appointments should be made strictly in accordance with the rules applicable to such appointments and purely on merit. Furthermore, the directive said that requests from ministries, divisions and departments or institutions of the federal government or any department or institution of any provincial or local government including the health and education departments would be considered on case-to-case basis by the ECP.
Moreover, the ECP said that as far as diversion of funds was concerned, requests from foreign donors to divert funds from one project to another would be considered on case-to-case basis. Diversion of funds in respect of projects of strategic importance would also be considered by the ECP on case-to-case basis. However, no funds would be diverted from an ongoing project to a new or existing development project in any constituency, the ECP said. The minister for law and justice, through his letter dated January 29 had sought review of the directive, dated January 22 issued by the ECP, whereby the ECP had said that “All kinds of recruitments in any ministry, division, department or institution of the federal government or any department or institution of any provincial and local governments is banned forthwith except recruitments by the federal or provincial public service commission. Diversion of funds already allocated to various development projects in the country is banned forthwith and the spending of funds so diverted shall stand frozen forthwith.”