LAHORE: Almost a week after the Pakistan Football Federation headquarters were sealed by the Lahore assistant commissioner, the court-elected PFF president Ashfaq Hussain Shah alleged that the Minister of Inter-Provincial Coordination Dr Fehmida Mirza was behind it.

Ashfaq’s PFF, which seized control of the PFF headquarters from the FIFA-appointed Normalisation Committee in a move that saw Pakistan suspended by the global football body, was thrown out of office last Sunday when the headquarters were sealed due to non-payment of its three-year lease to the Punjab government.

Ashfaq told Dawn on Saturday that he was filing a petition to seize back control but added that the manner in which the headquarters were occupied “on a weekly holiday shows it was the result of a conspiracy which was devised in the federal capital”.

Asked to name who was behind it, he added: “Fehmida Mirza is behind it and now we are going to court for a remedy.”

With the FIFA suspension continuing until the headquarters are handed over to the Haroon Malik-led NC, Prime Minister Imran Khan in September had instructed the IPC ministry to get the PFF headquarters vacated in order to resolve the PFF dispute which has plagued the game in the country for the last several years.

“We have no idea if any such instructions were given by the Prime Minister,” said Ashfaq, who was elected president in PFF polls conducted by the Supreme Court in December 2018 and has Special Assistant to Prime Minister Malik Aamir Dogar as his vice-president.

“The NC [which was appointed in September 2019] has wasted a lot of time in holding fresh elections of the PFF and is unacceptable to us,” he added. “We are ready to pay the lease amount, which is somewhere around Rs40,000 and we will move the court as well.”

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2021

Opinion

Editorial

A year later
Updated 08 Feb, 2025

A year later

A war of egos has been fought between a handful of individuals at the cost of the well-being of millions of ordinary Pakistanis.
Wheat decision
08 Feb, 2025

Wheat decision

THE federal decision to stop setting the minimum support price for wheat and cease the staple’s procurement...
Dhanmondi attack
08 Feb, 2025

Dhanmondi attack

HISTORY has shown that unless states deliver development and equal rights to all, disenfranchised people can target...
Depopulating Gaza
Updated 07 Feb, 2025

Depopulating Gaza

The least feasible "solution" is the Trumpian plan for Gaza’s ethnic cleansing and occupation, which is a non-starter.
‘Pause’ in US aid
07 Feb, 2025

‘Pause’ in US aid

THE impact of the Trump administration’s decision to ‘pause’ all US foreign aid programmes, especially those...
Mobilising opposition
07 Feb, 2025

Mobilising opposition

POLITICS makes strange bedfellows. There has not, for quite some time, been a guest list as intriguing as the one...