- Weakening the caretaker setup, demoralising honest officers
Massive and irrational bureaucratic transfers have taken place in three provinces which are likely to create problems for the caretaker governments instead of helping them. What is required to hold fair, free and transparent elections on July 25 is an efficient bureaucratic machinery at the disposal of the ECP and those looking after the federal and provincial administration. The replacement of top provincial administrators with outsiders is not likely to improve efficiency. It must have come as an embarrassment for the newly appointed Punjab IGP, a highly educated and decorated grade 21 police officer, when four of his Grade 22 colleagues refused to attend a meeting called by an officer junior to them in rank and calling his appointment a violation of the Police Order 2002.
The scale of the transfers is mind boggling. According to media report from Punjab alone as many as 35 deputy commissioners, MDs, DGs and 77 SSPs, AIGs and SPs have been already transferred while transfers of 34 provincial secretaries and MDs, and around 64 police officers have also been approved. From Sindh transfers of 14 secretaries, two AIGs, six commissioners, 33 deputy commissioners, 14 DIGs and various SSPs have been avowedly approved. From Balochistan the ECP has reportedly given green light to the transfers and postings of three secretaries, six commissioners, 33 deputy commissioners and various SDPOs.
The transfers are seen as a favour to Imran Khan who had written a letter to the caretaker prime minister to overhaul the bureaucratic machinery. To many the choice of the first three provinces which were ruled by the PML-N, PPP and Balochistan Awami Party would indicate the bias of the transferring authority. There is a likelihood now of ordering transfers from KP also to silence the critics. The ECP and the caretaker administration could have avoided the situation through targeted and small scale transfers of only those bureaucrats who were known to be the loyalists of the ruling parties. The massive transfers were altogether unnecessary, counterproductive and an act of injustice to apolitical and honest bureaucrats. Herding together the corrupt and the politically neutral officers could demoralise the honest administrators.