LAHORE: Former international Haider Hussain, the newly-appointed acting secretary of the Pakistan Hockey Federation, joined the PHF here on Wednesday after Asif Bajwa quietly left the office after developing differences with retired Brig Khalid Sajjad Khokhar, the president of the national game’s governing body.

First, the PHF president appointed Olympian Saeed Khan as acting secretary but later when it was realised that Saeed was not a member of Congress and therefore is not entitled to become the acting secretary, Haider was appointed.

The announcement on Haider’s appointment was made from Birmingham by the PHF president who is there to witness Pakistan hockey team’s matches in the Commonwealth Games starting today.

Bajwa did not respond to a number of calls made to him to get his comments.

It may be mentioned here that the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) on June 30 de-notified the PHF body headed by Brig Khokhar and appointed a four-member committee — which also included Brig Khokhar — to hold fresh PHF elections within 30 days.

Haider, 42, is not included in the committee which has been tasked with holding the elections.

So Brig Khokhar’s decision to appoint Haider and not to accept the four-member committee is likely to further increase the gulf between the PHF and the PSB.

Though the PHF is not bound to accept any such committee or to be de-notified by the PSB, which is the primary financial supporter of the federation, such poor relationship between the two institutions will in no way help to promote Pakistan hockey, which has already faced unprecedented decline over the past decade or so.

When highlighted that his name was not included in the PSB-appointed committee, Haider said the PHF president was in a better position to answer such questions.

However, he said the PHF was starting the process of holding fresh elections, which we due, from Thursday.

Haider on his first day as the acting secretary did not look in the right position to answer the questions, as the PHF affairs had been made complicated due to the cold war-like situation with the PSB and the quiet leaving of Bajwa as secretary of the federation.

It may be mentioned here that Bajwa was named as PHF secretary for the second time by Brig Khokhar in May 2019 after former Pakistan captain Shahbaz Ahmed Senior left the post in controversial circumstances.

Interestingly, Brig Khokhar at the time, said that Shahbaz had resigned and he had accepted it. Whereas Shahbaz in his media talk had claimed he did not resign.

A couple of days ago, Bajwa, in a chat with some of his close friends, also claimed that he did not resign.

Published in Dawn, July 28th, 2022