Amid much media speculations, the race for the next foreign secretary’s post – set to be vacated by Tehmina Janjua by April – is getting intense. As per Foreign Office (FO) insiders, the two front runners are High Commissioner to India, Sohail Mahmood, and Ambassador to Germany, Jauhar Saleem. Both of them belong to the 13th Common Training Program (CTP) and still have a few years of service left. When Ambassador Janjua retires in April, Ambassador Mahmood will be second in line and Ambassador Saleem at fourth. The first and third in line on the seniority list would retire by next year and aren’t being considered apparently. The two main contenders, both eminently qualified, could not have been more different. Sohail Mahmood, with masters degrees from Quaid-i-Azam University and Columbia University, has all the right ticks on his profile in terms of postings and assignments held, including those in Ankara, Washington DC, New York City and New Delhi. He has also remained as ambassador to Thailand previously. At the headquarters, he has served at Iran-Turkey and US desks as a young officer; and subsequently at higher echelons he has been the Director-General for Foreign Secretary’s Office and Additional Foreign Secretary for the Americas division. In the mould of Shamshad Ahmed and Aizaz Chaudhry, Ambassador Mahmood is known as a reliable, no-nonsense, work horse – who is a hard task master. A quintessential bureaucrat, he excels in a secretarial environment and has mastered the core elements of day to day working of the FO. His knowledge of policy issues is also well known. Somewhat officious with his subordinates, he is known to be very obedient to his superiors. His detractors, nonetheless, point out his ‘weak personality’, and rather ‘bureaucratic style and thinking’. But then again it is about becoming foreign secretary rather than foreign minister, they concede. It was an established tradition that in the past, prime ministers would meet the top two or three candidates and make up their mind as to who could best carry forward their foreign policy agenda Jauhar Saleem, with masters degrees from Government College Lahore, University of Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins University, is known for his strategic thinking and academic inclination. In fact, he has taught at renowned universities which include Georgetown University and Humboldt University. His posting portfolio is quite diverse as well with capitals such as Ankara, Brasilia, Sarajevo, Manama and Berlin. He is presently the longest serving envoy in the Pakistan Foreign Service, having first been appointed ambassador way back in 2007. At the headquarters, he served at the Middle East, US and Europe desks, and later as the head of the FO’s Lahore camp. At senior levels, he served as Director-General for Europe & CIS, Additional Foreign Secretary for Administration and Director-General of the prestigious Foreign Service Academy (FSA) in Islamabad. Equally adept at political, economic and cultural diplomacy, and with impressive speaking and diplomatic networking skills, Jauhar Saleem is more in the tradition of Sheheryar Khan, Riaz Khokar and Ashraf Jehangir Qazi, than the more recent foreign secretaries. His detractors point out to his flamboyance and sometimes unconventional thinking. They do concede, however, that the current times do not require more of the same and that he may be the right man to pursue an aggressive economic and security diplomacy. The proverbial dark horse in the race is the Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Moazzam Ahmed Khan. Though considerably lower on the seniority list and still in grade 21, Khan has a huge advantage of having served as staff officer to the incumbent foreign minister during his earlier stint in the last Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government. Not exactly known for intellectual brilliance, Khan has a pleasant personality and is reputed to be steady, loyal and trustworthy. It is pertinent to mention that no envoy from the UAE was ever considered for the top slot directly before. Incidentally, there have been two previous instances where ambassadors to Germany were either announced or presumed to be the next foreign secretary but did not make it in the end; Ambassador Abdul Basit and Ambassador Shahid Kamal respectively. Ambassador Basit was, reportedly, considered twice for the top slot owing to his impeccable credentials but the then prime minister Nawaz Sharif decided against his appointment on the advice of a certain lobby. Would this time be any different is yet to be witnessed. However, Jauhar Saleem, being the youngest of all the potential candidates, may still have another shot for the top job in the ministry if he is not posted this time around. On the other hand, Riaz Khokhar was the last envoy who had served in New Delhi as high commissioner prior to being appointed as foreign secretary. Talking to me on the subject, a former top envoy recalled that it was an established tradition that in the past, prime ministers would meet the top two or three candidates and make up their mind as to who could best carry forward their foreign policy agenda. He wondered whether Prime Minister Imran Khan had been informed about the said practice or not, is likely to be relevant to the situation. The writer is a diplomatic correspondent, at Daily Times Published in Daily Times, February 9th 2019.