APROPOS Capt S. Afaq Rizvi’s letter (Feb 6) wherein it is stated that “the fall of PIA began when the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) was married to the Pakistan Air Force.” In my reckoning this is wrong.

With highest considerations for Capt. S Afaq Rizvi’s age, seniority and pioneering contributions to PIA, I would avail myself of this opportunity to set the record straight vis-a-vis his piece with the following submissions:

PIA reached the zenith of its glory under the dynamic leadership of Air Marshal Nur Khan. The CAA was revolutionalised with massive infrastructure development in the shortest possible time under the leadership of Air Marshal Khurshid Anwar Mirza and the ‘open skies policy’ was introduced by a democratically-elected PML-N government and cannot be attributed to the CAA.

PIA flights going ‘dry’ cannot be attributed to Gen Ziaul Haq. The country had actually gone dry under the leadership of Prime Minister Z. A. Bhutto. During PIA’s glorious days, there was hardly a competitor available in the region. Gulf countries were then barely getting their act together with their new-found oil wealth.

PIA actually started to nosedive when the democratically-elected political masters of this country started to exploit it through illegal induction of manpower, continuous abuse of its resources, nepotism, cronyism, and unionism.

Both PIA and the CAA have been led over the years by ‘able and not so able’ PAF officers, bureaucrats, businessmen, entrepreneurs and financial wizards. Their results have sadly not been re-assuring, simply because of political interference and the inability of the chief executives to hire and fire. Gulf carriers are a success story because of their dictatorial leaderships, ready availability of petro-dollars aplenty and the authority to hire the best managers and workers, as well as a very short-fused firing policy.

For its revival, PIA needs a corporate restructuring and a dynamic leader with a free hand to choose the best professionals.

Air Vice Marshal (r) Abdus Sami Toor
Lahore

Published in Dawn, February 9th, 2016