17 April 2005	Sunday	07 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1426

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ISLAMABAD, April 16: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on Saturday replaced PIA’s MD Ahmed Saeed with MD PSO Tariq Kirmani on account of failure of the national flag carrier to meet Rs4.3 billion projected profit target in 2004 despite government subsidy of Rs23 billion.

The prime minister took the decision after a presentation at the prime minister house by the top PIA management on a number of contentious issues, including sale of A300B4, to which the Senate Standing Committee on Defence had objected.

PM Aziz was also briefed on the issue with regard to Roosevelt hotel, stuck-up Rs877 million, failure of Rs275 million passenger revenue accounting system and inability of PIA to meet Rs4.3 billion projected budgetary.

Officials in the prime minister’s secretariat said the prime minister had received complaints that PIA had refused to pay Rs3.11 billion to the Civil Aviation Authority and no provision was made in the accounts for the same while PIA declared profit for the year 2004.

Moreover, by the end of 2004, Rs1.1 billion were outstanding against PIA on account of unlawful termination of services of employees and contracts. Besides the collector central excise had raised demand of Rs1.05 billion “in respect of duties levied on tickets provided by the corporation to its staff either free of charge or at concession, repair of re-imported engines, non-availability of invoices etc.”

Sources said Prime Minister Aziz took a strong notice of the promotions made by the outgoing chairman just days prior to his ouster. It was learnt that a number of general managers and directors, including Khurshid Anwar, Imran Ahmed, Sikander Ilahi, Mumtaz Rajper and Air Vice Marshal Niaz, were removed by Mr Saeed during his tenure and he appointed non-professionals on professional posts. Some of the officials had contested their removal at various forums.