ISLAMABAD: A petition has been filed in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) against the appointments of chairman and commissioners of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP).

The petition — filed by a lawyer, Chaudhry Hassan Murtaza Maan — cited secretary finance, SECP chairman Zafarul Haq Hijazi, and its commissioners Akif Saeed, Fida Hussain Samoo, Zafar Abdullah and Tahir Mehmood as respondents. It requested the court to declare their appointments as illegal as the due process had not been followed.

A similar petition challenging the appointment of Mr Hijazi was dismissed by the IHC last June. That petition was filed in June 2015 by a citizen, Naseem Iqbal, through his counsel Asma Jahangir.

However, Mr Maan insisted that the recent petition was different from the previous one, which challenged the eligibility of the SECP chairman. In contrast, the recent petition objects to the process adopted to appoint Mr Hijazi and SECP commissioners.

“Before embarking upon the scrutiny of the selection and appointment processes of the above-mentioned respondents, it is important to first take stock of the relevant law and procedure dealing with the appointment of a commissioner and the chairman of the SECP and the manner in which a summary is to be prepared under the Rules of Business, 1973 to be placed before the prime minister,” the petition read.

The petition argued that according to the law an SECP commissioner should be a person of eminence, someone with exceptional qualities.

Guidelines given by the Supreme Court provides for the entire process to evaluate, shortlist, select and recommend a person to be appointed as SECP commissioner.

It mandates that the vacancies are to be advertised in the press inviting the applicants with qualifications as envisaged by the SECP Act for the posts.

The shortlisted candidates are to be interviewed by a selection committee, constituted by the prime minister for this purpose.

The selection committee, after taking into consideration the candidates’ qualifications, experience and performance during the interviews, recommends a panel of three candidates for each vacancy to the prime minister for final selection.

The petition, however, claimed that a competent authority approved the appointments of chairman and commissioners SECP without observing the prescribed rules.

In a related development, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf leader Andleeb Abbas wrote to the principal secretary to the prime minister challenging the recent extension to Saeed Ahmed as deputy governor of the State Bank of Pakistan.

Published in Dawn, February 26th, 2017