THIS refers to Asghar Mahmood’s letter ‘Vacant Ombudsman office’ (Nov 16). It is truly strange that the Federal Ombudsman’s office has been vacant since October 27, 2010, while the huge setup of the Federal Ombudsman secretariat headed by a federal secretary is in place without delivering.

Due to absence of the Federal Ombudsman (Wafaqi Mohtasib), not only a huge number of complainants against the government departments have been denied justice in the last two years, the position of the president of the Asian Ombudsman Association (AOA) having over 30 members is also vacant for, according to its charter, only Pakistan’s Federal Ombudsman could be the president of the association.

The Pakistan’s Federal Ombudsman office also houses the AOA secretariat.In 2009 and 2010, I worked for the AOA as ADB consultant in the ADB regional technical assistance project. It ended in August 2010 and another run of the same project was sanctioned by the ADB.

After the completion of the formalities it was ready to be signed by the ADB and president AOA but it could not materialise due to the absence of the president. One wonders why the government could not find one person to be appointed as Federal Ombudsman in the last two years.

HAIDER BHURGRI Islamabad