The Supreme Court has issued notices to former law minister Babar Awan and Law Secretary Masood Chishti in power projects delay case. A three-member SC bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry heard a petition by PML-N’s Khawaja Muhammad Asif against delaying of Nandipur and Chichokimallian power projects. The court was told that the national exchequer had incurred an unrecoverable loss of Rs 113 billion due to the delays. The CJ expressed anger over absence of the secretary of finance. During the hearing, the petitioner contended that both the projects were not accomplished in time due to a delay in issuance of bill of lading by the authorities concerned and this was causing an annual loss of Rs 62 billion. The CJP remarked that according to a commission report these projects were to be completed in 2011 but the negligence had cost the nation Rs 113 billion. Justice Jawwad S Khawaja noted that the Law Ministry bosses kept the files under the carpet for one year. Tariq Rahim, counsel for the Ministry of Water and Power, told the bench that the Law Ministry was responsible, adding that the ECC would take up the matter in its next meeting.
Roundtable urges
improving internal
policymaking processes
ISLAMABAD
PRESS RELEASE
The need of the hour is for political parties to look beyond constituency politics and focus more on national policy concerns. This was stated at a roundtable held at Jinnah Institute organized under a Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) political parties initiative. In his opening remarks, Raza Rumi, Director Policy & Programs Jinnah Institute, stressed on the need for political parties to develop existing policymaking capacity and in addition, have a special focus within each party on formulating policy that envisions the long term interests of the public, rather than short term electoral interests. Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed said that a gap exists in almost all political parties in Pakistan when it comes to policy formulation. He added that political parties are focused on constituency politics and on winning elections, rather than on formulating long-term national policies based on informed thinking. Professor Dr Mohammad Waseem of LUMS stressed that policy is as important to political parties as their ‘electability’. According to Dr Waseem, political parties’ focus has remained on networking with the voters at the constituency level so as to ensure election victories.
