From days of glory to its ruination was collective abuse by successive governments starting from Zia onward and managements they nominated, dominated by mediocrity, corruption scams and conflicts of interest, with no fear of accountability. Chairman Ilahi has been appointed and unless he enforces administrative discipline within management to serve as deterrence, nothing will change. He must understand that it takes more than pilot skills to be managers. If black sheep with fake degrees and history of criminal charges, who ran PIA when PPP or Musharraf was in power, continue to be there, nothing will change. Why did PIA management pilots and engineers not operate flights during strike as they did previously in 2011?
PIA is a statutory organisation, funded by taxpayers to provide quality reliable and safe travel to passengers by best qualified set of employees. It was mandatory for management and not their discretion not to scrutinise fresh recruits by cross checking their degrees with HEC or various boards of education and their ages and domiciles for authenticity. Any submission of fake or false degrees etc at time of recruitment, whenever discovered, automatically leads to termination of service without benefits as per PIA rules. Selectively sacking few with fake degrees and ignoring others would only create more indiscipline. Individuals against whom allegations for irregularities and various other criminal charges have been substantiated by investigation were appointed as MD, DMD etc which explains continuous rise in losses and a culture where crime pays.
Governments have changed and so have managements but the airline continues to be hostage to employees who would never have qualified on merit, tainted with charges of numerous financial and administrative irregularities and yet holding executive assignments. while losses continue to pileup and revenue pilferages on rise. Unless PIA’s human resource is upgraded to meet demands of highly competitive aviation industry, and unlisted assets such as slots and routes at numerous busy international airports secured, and traffic rights given to Gulf based airlines reviewed on principle of reciprocity, PIA cannot be revived whatever the plan of government.
While aviation technology has developed at fast pace, PIA has failed to upgrade basic educational requirements for initial induction, which has reflected on its services, discipline and ability for adapting to new technological advances. Although there is no dearth of qualified young men and women in Pakistan, PIA continues to maintain basic level minimum requirements.
ANEELA CHANDIO
Sukkur
PIA has been eaten alive by its incompetent surplused employees and by corrupt high bureaucrats and politicians.
Well written. Thank you for your input..but alas the majority of pakistanis cannot comprehend this fact .
PIA is just one single symptom of a potent disease afflicting the country and that disease is complete impunity from mal-practice, abuse of power, dipping the fingers in the national till, shoddy governance aided and abetted with blatant lies, and rampant corruption in its diverse forms.
The pertinent question has not been addressed and it is obvious that it has never been addressed by the past rulers and there is absolutely no likelihood that it will ever be addressed by the current lot. Despite demands from the public and the media, apart from bogus and cosmetic changes to fool the public, the disease still remains completely untreated. Who is going to enforce genuine accountability on unaccountable rulers, their front men, their police and their bureaucrats? Is it the public and the media, is it the responsibility of the judiciary or as a last resort, is it the responsibility of the army to administer a potent dose of the bitter medicine to cure the disease?
The ruler have devised two very shoddy answers which they emphatically bring to the attention of the public with utter lack of shame in every political talk show. The electorate holds them accountable at election time, and it will take time for democracy to mature.
As for the electorate holding them accountable at election time, the public can only vote them out but they cannot hold them accountable. They can neither pronounce them guilty, nor can they recover looted wealth. As for democracy taking time to mature, if only honest and upright candidates with untainted reputations meticulously scrutinized by the electoral commission are allowed to contest the elections, the democracy becomes mature on the very first day in office. It has nothing to do with maturity of democracy, it is all about shutting the doors for immoral deviants who in office defile democracy.
This is where IK is right, in order to cure the disease of corruption and shoddy governance, there is just one way; you have to bar the Charlton right at the entry point, and that is the job of the electoral commission which must also be held accountable by the supreme court if it fails to deliver especially on this very fundamental and extremely vital issue.
I beg your pardon, the rot did not start with Zia, it started with Bhutto who patronised the worker's unions and stuffed PIA, Steel Mill etc with thousands of Jialas
Rafique Saigol and Nur Khan were appointed by ZAB and it was he who gave them a free hand to deliver, which they did. Under Zia nepotism started and so did massive corruption such as sale of Dc10. Zia posted his relative Salim to USA and all procurements and fleet induction were routed through his frontman Shifta based in Tokyo. Facts should never be distorted by biases.
Forced employment of jialas has been PPP's policy from day one started by Bhutto, which resulted in many industries going sick, the present state of PIA and Steel Mill is for that reason, even today PPP people on talk shows defend this policy. How can any one deny these facts.
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