PESHAWAR: Governor to sign bill if SC’s objections have been removed
By Bureau Report
PESHAWAR, Nov 22: Governor Ali Mohammad Jan Aurakzai has said he will give assent to the Hasba bill only if the NWFP government has removed the reservations of the Supreme Court.
"I will study the bill keeping in view the reservations of the apex court to it,” he said, while talking to newsmen after addressing the convocation of the University of Engineering and Technology here on Wednesday.
When asked if he would sign the bill, he replied: “I will sign it if the court’s reservations are removed.” He said he had received the document just two days ago.
Mr Aurakzai said the government would soon start a dialogue with tribesmen of Bajaur Agency to sign a peace deal. He claimed that peace had been restored in North Waziristan Agency after a peace deal.
He said the government had also started negotiations with tribesmen of the Khyber Agency and things were moving in the right direction.
Negotiations between the local administration and tribesmen collapsed in the aftermath of the Oct 30 bombing of a seminary in which more than 80 people died in the Bajaur Agency.
Answering a question, the governor denied Afghan government's allegations of Pakistan’s involvement in the unrest in that country. "Islamabad has nothing to do with Afghanistan's internal affairs,” he said.
Earlier, speaking at the convocation, he said that a state-of-the-art university of science and technology would be established in the province shortly.
It would be a part of the massive programme of opening nine such universities in the entire country in collaboration with certain countries, the governor said.
The federal government had been laying stress on the higher education and it had made a phenomenal increase in the fund for public sector universities -- from Rs600 million to Rs22 billion per annum over the past few years, the governor said.
At the convocation, 250 graduates were awarded MSc and BSc degrees in various disciplines of engineering sciences.
Nine graduates also received gold medals, while four got presidential awards for distinctive positions in their respective disciplines.
The governor gave away degrees and awards to the graduates.
The vice-chancellor of the university, Syed Imtiaz Hussain Gilani, highlighted the performance of the varsity.
