September 21, 2008	Sunday	Ramazan 20, 1429

ISLAMABAD, Sept 20: Five sports federations have so far paid no heed to the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) reminders to vacate the premises of the Pakistan Sports Complex.

The PSB has sent a third reminder to the federations to vacate the premises of the Pakistan Sports Complex.

Letters were sent to the Pakistan Volleyball Federation, Pakistan Rowing Federation, Alpine Club, Kabbadi Federation and Pakistan Athletics Federation around three weeks ago by the PSB to vacate the premises by Sept 10.

A sports federation official, on condition of anonymity, told Dawn that “they were invited by the PSB to use their premises with an idea to have a centralised office of all the sports federations at the Sports Complex”.

The offices, he said, were handed over by the former PSB Director General Arif Siddiqui in 2003.

“But now we are being advised to vacate the offices which is not fair on the part of the PSB,” he added. When contacted the media officer of PSB, Azam Dar said: “Yes, we have sent another reminder to the five sports federations and this may be the last one for them.”

Dar warned that sports federation must vacate the offices otherwise the PSB would be compelled to take a drastic action against the federations.

When asked about the drastic actions Dar made no comment on the likely PSB actions.

“The board will not tolerate any leniency in this stance,” said the official.

Regarding shifting of the sports ministry from a rented location to the PSB premises, he said that the offices of the federal sports minister and secretary sports have also been shifted to the premises of the board.

The vacated offices would be used by the sports ministry, he concluded.