PESHAWAR, June 3: The German Technical Cooperation (GTZ), a German organisation which provides donations and technical support, has expressed concern over the provincial government’s move to block the appointment of a foreigner as chief executive of the city’s oldest Lady Reading Hospital (LRH), sources say.

The provincial government had decided to appoint a foreigner as chief executive of the hospital with the financial and technical assistance of the GTZ.

The sources said that the government was convinced that the LRH needed a professional manger and the provincial health minister Inayatullah Khan addressed a press conference in this regard.

It had been decided that the government would pay Rs150,000 per month to the newly appointed chief executive, while the rest of the amount would be paid by the Centre for International Migration, an organisation of the German government.

Meanwhile, the health department sent a summary to the chief minister regarding the issue in late March. The summary was still awaited to be sent to the health secretariat.

The sources said the health minister reportedly received a call from Jamaat-I-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmad, asking him not to appoint a German as chief executive of the LRH.

The sources said that the minister had managed to convince Mr Qazi on the appointment of a German as it was in the public interest, but the JI chief made another call later asking the minister to postpone the process.

They said that the professors of the LRH had persuaded the JI chief and asked him that the appointment of a foreigner would bring a bad name to the MMA government in the province.

However, the sources said, the health minister, who had actually flouted the idea of appointing a foreigner, had assured his support to GTZ.

The sources said the government recurrent expenditure on the LRH with 2,500 employees was $6 million per year, but the institution’s performance was declining with every passing day.

A top official in the provincial health secretariat said that a team visited the 1200-bed hospital before starting the process of appointing a foreigner as its chief executive. The team found that the LRH had the potential of becoming a world class hospital, but needed a professional manager, he added.

The post was advertised in an international magazine by the Ministry of Economic Cooperation Development, Germany last year.

All the three teaching hospitals in the city -- the LRH, Khyber Teaching Hospital and Hayatabad Medical Complex -- are headed by professors who have no experience of management.