February 24, 2008	Sunday	Safar 16, 1429

PESHAWAR, Feb 23: Appointment of regional coordination officers (RCOs) with sweeping powers has created resentment in official circles of the Frontier government, it is learnt.

Information gathered from different stakeholders in the backdrop of posting orders of the RCOs on Feb 14 suggested that a number of discrepancies had to rectified to make the new ‘experiment’ a success.

The NWFP governor had on Jan 17 approved the setting up of three RCOs’ offices in different places of the province covering settled and adjoining tribal areas. The step had been taken to improve coordination at the local level.

The RCOs have been given immense powers, which many in official circles consider ambitious and believe that certain laws and legislations have to be repealed to materialise the plan.

An official dispatch from the revenue department on Feb 22 pointed out lacunas in the new arrangement, particularly with the role of RCOs in disposing of revenue, Frontier Crimes Regulation, administrative and service nature appeals.

The department argued that the government in 2001 had established revenue appellate courts at the regional level in the province for dealing with revenue-related cases and affairs. For this purpose, an ordinance had been promulgated on Aug 13, 2001, which was a set of amendments made to various Acts, including the NWFP Tenancy Act, 1950, and the West Pakistan Land Revenue Act, 1967.

Under the new arrangement, according to the department, revenue functions given to RCOs were in conflict with these amendments because the appellate courts had already been established by substituting commissioners in erstwhile divisions.

It pointed out that the function of disposing revenue appeals at two forums of different functionaries would create confusion. It said entrusting revenue-related affairs to RCOs would create legal implications.

Apart from reservations of the revenue department, sources said the placement of all the three officers from the District Management Group (DMG) had also created resentment among officers from the Provincial Management Service (PMS), formerly known as the Provincial Civil Service (PCS).

The officers from the PMS would make a representation in a couple of days to the NWFP governor to allocate quota to them, the sources said.

They said at least one officer from the PMS should be appointed as RCO as was the case when posts of commissioners were intact.

The sweeping powers given to RCOs have also annoyed senior police officers working as deputy inspector general of police.

The RCOs, as per their job description, will take reports on law and order issues from DIGPs and district coordination officers and will subsequently issue guidelines to them.

Police officers argued that in different places senior grade 20 and even 21 officers from the Police Service of Pakistan were serving as DIGPs and, therefore, reporting to a junior officer would make the whole concept ineffective because of seniority constraints. They believed that the issue could be resolved if senior grade 21 officers were posted as RCOs.