Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Senate’s subcommittee on PIA probing the alleged sale of PIA Bus 310 to a German firm was informed on Tuesday that the name of the former CEO, a German national, was removed from the ECL by the specific order of the then interior minister on a letter from the Foreign Office.

The subcommittee headed by Senator Farhatullah Babar and including Senator Nauman Wazir and Tahir Hussain Mashhadi met in the office of Civil Aviation Division Secretary in the PIA Complex in Islamabad and attended by Civil Aviation secretary, besides high ranking officials of PIA, Interior, Defence, FIA, JAG branch and others.

The meeting was informed that under the directions of the Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly the case had since been referred to the NAB for inquiry. Besides, the FIA has also taken notice and started its own investigations.

The Civil Aviation secretary said that the sale of the aircraft in question had been stopped and that it was still the property of the government of Pakistan. However, he said that negotiations for not charging the parking fee for the aircraft were still going on.

The committee members were surprised at the glaring flaws in the tendering process while neither the director procurement nor the PIA MD had the authority to finalise the sale and move the aircraft outside the country.

The committee noted that when the former PIA MD Mr Bernd Hildenbrand failed to return to Pakistan after the expiry of one month period the Interior Ministry wrote to the FO to take up the matter with the German Embassy in Islamabad on whose guarantee and commitment the permission had been granted. “We will demand the Foreign Office to produce the written commitment / guarantee given by the German Embassy and ask whether and when it would take up the matter with the German Embassy in Islamabad and what was the response of the embassy?” Senator Farhatullah Babar said. “We must not let the former MD escape from answering some questions about the attempted sale of the aircraft,” he said.

Published in Daily Times, January 31^st 2018.