PESHAWAR, April 7: The NWFP government has been finalising proposals about the proposed Prosecution of Offences Ordinance 2002.

The federal government had submitted the draft of the ordinance to the four provincial governments a few months back, with the directives to finalise their recommendations and submit it to the Centre.

As prosecution is a provincial subject, after taking final decision on the ordinance the federal government would again circulate it to the four provinces for its promulgation by the respective provincial governments.

Under the proposed ordinance, the administration of the prosecution service throughout the province should be vested in the director, an officer of BS-21, who should be assisted in the performance of his duties by such number of additional directors and public prosecutors as the government may determine from time to time.

Moreover, the administration of the service in a district should, subject to direction and control of the director, be vested in a district public prosecutor, who should be assisted in the performance of his duties by such number of additional district prosecutors, deputy assistant prosecutors and assistant district prosecutors.

Experts dealing with the proposed ordinance claimed that various sections of the ordinance were vague.

Section 4 of the ordinance proposes that the government should exercise control over the services. It is not mentioned whether the prosecution services would be attached with the law department or home department.

At present, the existing prosecution branch works under the law department in the NWFP, whereas in rest of the three provinces it is attached with the home department.

Under section 8 of the proposed ordinance, recruitments to posts in the service should be through a competitive examination held by the provincial Public Service Commission. Moreover, it is proposed that functionaries in the existing prosecution set-up shall be eligible to apply as per rules for the posts advertised by the Public Service Commission.

Experts claimed that the existing public prosecutors had already been appointed after selection by the commission and there was no need of asking them to again appear before the commission.

They suggested that those prosecutors who had already qualified before the PSC, be retained in the cadre posts, whereas those who had not qualified before the PSC be asked to appear in the examination.

The ordinance also proposes that the prosecutors should have the right of audience in any court of law.