PESHAWAR, May 17: The Accountant General Pakistan Revenue (AGPR) has raised question about the legal status of the governor’s Fata secretariat and has made serious observations about huge amounts of money being spent by it under various heads, said an official letter. As a result of re-organisation of provincial set-up, secretary to the governor has not only become the administrative head of the governor’s secretariat but he also supervises planning and development, finance, and law and order in all the seven tribal agencies and six Frontier Regions (FRs).

The AGPR, while questioning the need for the Fata secretariat, has sought opinion of the NWFP chief secretary (CS) on powers and functions of the secretary to the governor.

In a letter sent to the CS on May 3, the AGPR has expressed concern over payment being made to the Fata secretariat from the funds provided by the federal government.

“All these payments are irregular in one way or the other. This office (AGPR) has been honouring their claims provisionally as a stopgap arrangement and to facilitate functioning of these organisations”, the letter added.

Sources said that the AGPR’s observations on legal status of the Fata secretariat would be discussed in a high level meeting to be held in Peshawar on Wednesday. CS Ejaz Ahmad Qureshi and other senior officials of the federal and provincial governments would attend the meeting.

Official sources said that both the AGPR and the federal ministry of state and frontier region (SAFRON) have serious reservations on status of the Fata secretariat and unlimited powers being exercised by the secretary to the governor.

They said that a meeting held on Jan 23, 2001 with the then chief executive in the chair, had observed that instead of setting up a separate secretariat for Fata, the existing secretariat of the governor should be strengthened.

“No notification regarding establishment of the Fata secretariat by the federal government has been conveyed to the AGPR so far”, the letter said.

It has been pointed out that under the previous arrangements all affairs in Fata were run by the provincial government machinery. Under these arrangements all the provincial secretaries of the line departments were acting as agents to the federal government for Fata.

Now the whole “show” is run by the secretary to the governor for Fata, while rules of business still show the provincial secretaries as administrative heads for their respective areas in Fata, which creates a duplicity.

The AGPR, in its three-page letter, said that a legal question about the constitutional position of the governor could be agitated at any stage. It said: “As a governor he is not accountable to any committee of the parliament, but as a Principal Account Officer (PAO), he is answerable to the Public Account Committee (PAC) of the National Assembly for all the expenditures he does in that capacity. How to reconcile the two strata needs consideration at a proper forum”.

The NWFP governor’s secretary for Fata is empowered to approve project up to Rs60 million in respect of development activities in the Fata, while, as per manual of the planning and development division, constitution of a departmental development working party should be such that there is sufficient representation of the finance and planning and development divisions. It has, however, been observed that representatives of the finance and planning and development wings of the governor’s secretariat constitute these committees. They neither represent the federal finance division nor have been authorised to do so. In the opinion of the AGPR, all the approvals accorded by these committees are irregular as finance and planning and development wings of the federal government do not participate in the approval proceedings.

Similarly, a large number of employees have been recruited by the committee without participation of the representatives from the finance and establishment divisions. The internal wings for law and order and legal matters also do not have representation of respective federal ministries. It has also been pointed out that a large number of employees, deputy directors and XENs have been posted in the secretariat, but terms and conditions and structure their services have not been determined by the federal government.