ISLAMABAD: A senior audit officer claimed that as he planned the audit of Rs14.56 trillion transactions in different departments in the financial year 2014-15, the PML-N government dumped him into an insignificant position at the Pakistan Post.

The Islamabad High Court (IHC), however, enabled Asifur Rehman, the director general audit (DGA), to carry out the audit by suspending his transfer orders. The court issued the direction after Mr Rehman challenged his transfer.

Justice Noorul Haq N. Qureshi suspended the notifications of July 15 and July 17 issued by Controller General of Accounts (CGA) Farah Ayub Tarin and the Establishment Division placing 16 officers of the Pakistan Audit and Accounts Service (PAAS) under the controller general of accounts, ministry of finance, and further transfer of Mr Rehman to the Pakistan Post as the chief accounts officer.

Petitioner alleges govt posted him out to avoid departmental audits

The petition alleged that the government tried to get rid of DGA Rehman at a time when he had planned to conduct 536 audits of the federal government departments.

These audits amounted to a total of Rs14.56 trillion. The Establishment Division on July 15 placed the services of Mr Rehman along with six PAAS officers of grade 21 and 10 officers of grade 20 at the disposal of the controller general of accounts.”

On July 17, the CGA issued a notification for the posting of Mr Rehman “against the post of chief accounts officer, the directorate of Pakistan Post.”

Raja Amir Abbas, the counsel for Mr Rehman, adopted before the court that under the rules the DGA worked under the auditor general of Pakistan (AGP).

The office of the AGP is independent and does not fall under the control of the executive, he maintained.

The counsel said the finance division was treating the AGP office as an attached department which was against the constitution.

The CGA and the has unlawfully handed over the postings/transfers of the PAAS officers to the Establishment Division which in turn compromised on the ability of the petitioner and other officers to comment objectively and independently on financial performance and management of the government.

He claimed that this was the main reason behind placing the audit officers under the control of the CGA of the finance ministry.

It may be noted that since December last year DGA Rehman is the third PAAS officer who filed such a petition against the alleged encroachment of the executive in the domain of the auditors.

Initially, the then Accountant General of Pakistan Revenue (AGPR), Tahir Mehmood, filed a petition with the IHC after the PML-N government suspended him.

On July 18, AGP Akhtar Buland Rana also approached the IHC fearing ‘out-of-turn’ appointment of CGA Tarin as the AGP. In both the cases, the court restrained the government from taking any action against the petitioners.

Published in Dawn, July 26th, 2014