PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Iqbal Zafar Jhagra has granted expost facto approval to appointment of political agents of Kurram, Mohmand, Bajaur and Khyber agencies six months after the appointments were made earlier in February this year.

A notification to this effect was issued by establishment department on Tuesday.

The notiñcation says that governorhas been pleased to grant ex-post facto approval to the posting/transfer, ordered on February 9, 2016.

The retrospective approval from the governor came after Senate Standing Committee on State and Frontier Regions (Safron) said that the order was not issued with the approval of the competent authority, therefore, it should be withdrawn immediately.

The Safron report, a copy of which is available with Dawn, notes that political agents of Kurram, Khyber, Bajaur and Mohmand agencies were transferred on February 9. It says that the then governor Sardar Mehtab Ahmed Khan noted in his remarks on the summary of political agents appointments that `the process of selection of these officers has taken long exercise of scrutiny on selection by all the concerned. However, since I will be relinquishing my charge today, I would leave it to chief secretary to take appropriate decision on this matter.

The report says that the chief secretary appeared before the committee and submitted that as per policy of provincial government, governor and chief secretary were competent authorities for posting and transfer of civil servant in BPS-18 and above.

He also said that the post of political agent could not be left vacant owing to precarious law and order situation in Fata as political agent was executive and judicial head of an agency. He said that in the view of the permission granted by the governor on the summary, the transfers were made effective in public and national interes t.

However, the standing committee after deliberating the issue concluded that chief executive of Fata was governor and only he had the authority to approve postings of political agents.

It also noted that the executive authority of governor to approve transfer and posting of political agents could not be delegated to another officer. The senators were also of the view that chief secretary should have either continued with the sitting political agents till the arrival of the new governor or given additional charge to the additional political agents.

The report said that the orders were issued when there was no permanent governor, who could exercise the authority of transfer/posting of the political agents.

The committee directed that a fresh summary for transfer/posting of political agents should be initiated by Fata Secretariat and that names of incumbent officers should not be included in the list.

They also noted that most of those officers including political agent of Khyber Agency had no experience of worl(ing in Fata. The region should not be turned into testing ground for training novices in political administration, as demonstrated in the Februaryorder,they added.

The committee also recommended disciplinary action against chief secretary and the then secretary of establishment for their involvement in the said episode.