ISLAMABAD: The federal government has kept mum about the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) chief minister’s (CM) proposal to appoint his blue-eyed officers as chief secretary (CS) and inspector general police (IGP).
Sources told Pakistan Today that the Establishment Division did not pay heed to the caretaker KP CM’s summary in which the KP government requested the federal government to appoint Ahmed Hanif Orakzai as KP CS, Muhammad Naeem Khan as KP IGP, Zakir Hussain Afridi as Secretary Home Department and Akbar Khan as Peshawar Commissioner after the suicide attack on Awami National Party (ANP) corner meeting on July 10.
Sources close to this development also said that the tussle between the KP CM as well as, CS and IG was from the first day of his taking charge. “Justice (r) Dost Muhammad Khan was not happy with the appointment of Kamran Naveed Baloch as CS because his political masters wanted blue-eyed officers before the election as they thought that the present bureaucratic set up cannot benefit them in the election”, sources said.
Soon afterwards the unfortunate incident of a senior ANP leader’s martyrdom took place and the KP CM taking advantage of this incident asked the Establishment Division to transfer and replace the CS and IG with Ahmed Hanif Orakzai and Muhammad Naeem Khan.
Ahmed Hanif Orakzia is a Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS) officer who belongs to the 15th common, a common of those officers who remained on important positions in Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N) government. He belongs to Orakzia agency and is reportedly very close to the high-ups of KP’s main political party.
Furthermore, PAS officer visited the Establishment Division after the KP government summary. “He was behaving like a CS despite the fact his notification has not been issued yet,” sources added.
The incumbent KP setup wanted to appoint Akbar Khan as Peshawar’s commissioner, a BS-20 officer of PCS who is serving as principal secretary to chief secretary, in addition to this; the government had a desire to appoint Zakir Hussain Afridi (BS-20, PCS) as Home Department secretary.
Sources told that KP government had not given any substantive reason for transferring these officers; the summary send to Establishment Division shows that the existing Peshawar Commissioner Shahab Ali Shah is an unwilling officer who failed to report any untoward situation, albeit he was unable to report any prior report in view of the previous high-level meeting.
Similarly, the summary stated that Home Department Secretary Ikramullah Khan is not a willing worker and his administration made no organisational coordination between the government agencies.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman on Wednesday asked the KP CM to not support any party, adding that “your duty is to hold free and fair elections, do your duty.”
Pakistan Today made a number of attempts to contact to the Establishment Division Spokesperson but in vain. On the other hand, the KP CM spokesperson said that all allegations are baseless.