SC strikes down OGRA chairman appointment

The Court held this on Friday while announcing its verdict in a constitutional petition filed by Muhammad Yasin, an OGRA employee, which challenges Sadiq’s appointment. Declaring Sadiq’s appointment as illegal and void ab initio, the Court has ordered him to return all the salary and privileges drawn from the public exchequer in the course of his service as Chairman of the powerful oil and gas sector regulator.Chairman of the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) Tauqir Sadiq, who is brother-in-law of a leading member of the key party in Government, was appointed by the Federal Government to this post in July 2009.The unanimous judgment was passed by a three-member bench comprising Justice Shakirullah Jan, Justice Jawwad S. Khawaja and Justice Khilji Arif Hussain. Justice Khawaja, who authored the judgment, has recorded the reasons for the Court’s decision in detail.The foremost reason given is that this appointment violated the criteria expressly laid down in section 3(4) of the OGRA Ordinance, 2002. The said section commands that the head of this independent institution must be a person who is an eminent professional of “known competence and integrity”.Sadiq, against whom there are a number of corruption allegations, and who purports to have an LLM degree from a ‘fake degree-granting’ institution, the American University in London, was found falling short of the required standard. The judgment clarifies the legal implications of Section 3(4) of the OGRA Ordinance and other similarly-worded sections in statutes governing independent regulatory bodies.It has been held that under the law and the Constitution, while the executive retains power to make appointments, it has to exercise this power in a demonstrably fair and honest manner. The judgment outlines a three-pronged test for this which stresses objectivity, relevance and due diligence. Failing this test, appointments made by the Executive will be invalid, and liable to be struck down upon judicial review.The judgment closely examines the process followed during the appointment of Sadiq. It finds the process fraught with serious irregularities. It points out that applicants were being selected and rejected in an arbitrary and lawless manner with little attention being paid to objective indicators of their ability and merit. Such was the incompetence and lack of probity in the selection process that during Sadiq’s four interviews and several short-listings, no one noticed the fake degree he was relying on, or the other unsubstantiated tall claims on his CV.The interviews of 17 candidates were all rushed in a single day, and a single field expert was deemed sufficient for examining the technical prowess of candidates from wide-ranging fields. Because of this, and a number of other short-comings pointed out in the judgment, the Court found the appointment process falling short of the required legal standards.The judgment also takes note of a number of serious corruption allegations leveled at Sadiq. The Court observed that the allegations were worthy of a serious investigation, and has directed NAB to submit a report to the Court in this regard, ithin a period of 45 days.The Court also held that the fundamental rights of the people of Pakistan were in danger if improper appointments went on being made to key positions in autonomous regulatory bodies. The importance of these institutions for the economic life of the nation and its citizens is ever-increasing. Therefore, the duty to secure the fundamental rights of the people cast on the Court by Article 184(3), obliges it to take cognizance of such matters. This is why the petitioner’s application was held maintainable.One of the interesting features of the judgment is the wide range of references it contains. Other than reference to the Constitution, statutes and precedent cases, which are usual in such judgments, it also quotes the 11th century Persian political classics “Siyasat-nama” and “Qabus-nama” as well as couplets from Sheikh Saadi and Saaghar Siddiqui. Contemporary scholarly works on regulatory economics and constitutional law are also extensively cited. Also notable is the fact that an Urdu version of the salient features of the judgment has been simultaneously published.