LAHORE: The special audit of the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) accounts for the 2008-2013 period has been completed and Dawn learnt that some five objections, though not of serious nature, were raised during the process.

The auditors went back to Islamabad with three files of the audited accounts.

The audit was conducted on the instructions of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who is also the PHF patron-in-chief.

According to the federation, a total grant of Rs770 million was received from the federal government during the PPP tenure (2008-2013).

The auditors, the PHF officials say, raised some objections over the procedures, adopted in maintaining the accounts.

However, the officials claim, the same procedure (of maintaining accounts) is being followed which was adopted at the time of PHF formation way back in the late 1940s.

“But the objections are not of serious nature as was the hue and cry raised by some ex-Olympians in the past, indicating that there is looting going on in the PHF,” an official said.

“There was no objection or query raised by the auditors before the PHF about an amount of Rs200 million missing in the record. Therefore, all such news reports [about this] published in the media are false and it is just an attempt to malign the federation,” the same official insisted.

It may be mentioned that some former Olympians, who later joined the PHF, had levelled allegations of malpractices within the PHF during the tenure of former president Qasim Zia (2008-2013).

It is interesting to recall that the then PPP federal government showed significant generosity towards the game of hockey, despite the fact that stalwarts like Islahuddin Siddiqui, Shahnaz Sheikh, Ayaz Mahmood and many others had been criticising the federation for the alleged misuse of funds given by the government.

The prime minister, it is important to mention here, since 2013 has stopped the PHF annual grant, unless the previous PHF accounts are audited.

It may be cited that the PHF, which in recent times has been solely depending on government’s grant to run its affairs, has been facing acute financial crisis during the last couple of years. Sadly, this crisis has even affected the national team’s participation in several premier international tournaments.

Except for Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, who has given the PHF a grant of Rs100 million during the last two years, unfortunately no other source came forward with a big heart to help out the PHF in order to help save the fast declining game of hockey in Pakistan.

Published in Dawn, July 3rd, 2015

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