0
ISLAMABAD, Sept 17: A government bill designed to let the country's top intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, recruit its own civilian officers came under fire on Friday as it was taken up in the National Assembly.
Two opposition members, who initiated the general debate on the bill, said taking such recruitments out of the Federal Public Service Commission purview would compromise the rule of merit and give too much powers to an agency already perceived to be overly intrusive in national affairs.
But a statement of objects and reasons accompanying the Federal Public Service Commission (Amendment) Bill said the move to take ISI posts out of the FPSC purview was "in the larger interest of the country" to find suitable hands for sensitive jobs.
What was expected to be a heated debate was cut short by the muezzin's call for Friday prayers before the house was adjourned until 5pm on Monday. The brief sitting was also marked by a rare climb-down by speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain who deleted some of his own remarks from the record of the assembly proceedings to end a verbal duel with an outspoken member of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML), Kashmala Tariq.
An attempt by Hafiz Hussain Ahmed of the Muttahida Majlis-i- Amal stoke the controversy on whether President Pervez Musharraf should give up as army chief by Dec 31 failed to pick up after the speaker said pending opposition motions on the subject would take time to process.
The government also did not seem to be enthusiastic to counter the MMA member's threat of "the right to use constitutional and popular" means after Information and Broadcasting Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed retracted a reported statement on Wednesday suggesting that the president would continue to wear his army uniform even beyond Dec 31.
"ARBITRARY" POWERS: Abdul Mujeeb Pirzada of the People's Party Parliamentarians (PPP, initiating the general debate, or the first reading of the government bill, said the move would give the ISI arbitrary powers in violation of transparency and merit envisioned by the existing law as well as a Supreme Court judgment on the matter.
"The genie already out of the bottle will become uncontrollable," Pakistan Muslim League-N member Khwaja Mohammad Asif said. The bill's statement of objects and reasons said the FPSC was responsible for conducting tests and examinations for recruitment to all-Pakistan services, civil services and civil posts connected with the affairs of the federation in basic pay scales of 16 and above.
Certain posts in various government ministries, divisions and departments, including the ISI directorate-general, were brought within the FPSC purview through amendments made in the year 2000 in the FPSC Ordinance and the FPSC (Functions) Rules, it said.
Candidates for posts of ISI directorate-general, it said, "pass through a transparent and systematic process comprising written tests, interviews, medical examinations and, in some cases, intelligence and psychological tests also".
The statement said security clearance of selected candidates "is carried by the vetting agency" of the ISI directorate-general "keeping in view the standards and peculiar requirements in accordance with the mandate" of the agency.
"A panel of highly qualified senior officers select the candidates keeping in view the sensitive nature of jobs to be assigned/performed, and the candidates are tested/interviewed with particular emphasis on their potential, trends, zeal, devotion, dedication and psychological suitability required for the job," it said..
"It is, therefore, in the larger interest of the country to make the recruitment of the posts of the directorate-general ISI by the department itself instead of FPSC," the statement said.
VERBAL CLASH: The verbal clash between speaker Amir Hussain and Ms Kashmala Tariq erupted immediately after the question hour when the PML member from Lahore complained about alleged non- fulfilment of a promise made during a previous assembly session to form a house committee to probe activities of the Bahria Town housing firm after at least two people were killed by gunfire near Rawalpindi.
Ms Tariq also complained about the activities of what she called Park View housing project in Lahore. The speaker said he did not want to involve himself in a controversy and questioned the member's right to raise this issue and correctness of her statement about a promise made for probe by a house committee.
This led to an exchange of hot words between Ms Tariq and the speaker, who side-stepped the issue by asking Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sher Afgan Khan Niazi to move for the consideration of the Federal Public Service (Amendment) Bill.
However, Ms Tariq did not seem to pocket the snub and went to some members on both the treasury and opposition benches apparently to check notes with them about the previous session's proceedings on what she called a land scam and even went to the rostrum to talk with the speaker again.
After PML-N member Khwaja Asif also supported Ms Tariq's statement about the previous proceedings, the speaker seemed to relent his stance, saying he had already told some members who met him to discuss the matter in his chamber rather than agitate in the house.
In what seemed to be at least a moral victory of the ruling party member against a usually unbending chair, the speaker said he did not want to injure any member's feelings but would expunge his unspecified remarks that might have done it.
