If the government accepts huge contingent liabilities of a subsidiary of Fauji Foundation, is the Foundation still a private concern? Farhatullah Babar

The managing director of Fauji Foundation, Lt. Gen. Amjad (retired), finally broke his silence on the conflict between the Foundation and the Senate on the question of turf. In an interview with The News (Islamabad edition, June 11), he said that he would not appear before the Senate's Defence Committee to be quizzed about the sale of Khoski Sugar Mills. The Foundation is a private concern and there is no law under which he can be asked to appear before such a body, he argued.

General Amjad was appointed as managing director of Fauji Foundation on April 4, 2002, while still in uniform, and his appointment order was issued by the GHQ. Would the GHQ or the Defence Ministry issue the appointment orders of a serving officer to a private foundation like, say, the Edhi Foundation?

According to him the foundation is a "trust meant to undertake commercial activities." A trust is a statutory body that exists and functions under the Charitable Endowment Act, 1890. The Foundation owes its birth to an Act of Parliament, which has every right to oversee the organisation.

The working of the foundation is overseen by a committee of administration appointed by the government under Section 13 of the Act. With the secretary of defence as chairman, it has five three-star officers of the defence services. Is there any private entity whose management is in the hands of a committee which has a federal secretary as its chairman and senior generals as its members?

It has also been claimed that as a corporate body the Foundation was not getting a single penny from the government, that it has not received any "undue favour" from the government.

But in May 2003, FFC Jordan, a subsidiary of Fauji Foundation, was bailed out of financial crisis by the government using the taxpayers' money to the tune of several billion rupees. According to the Economic Survey of 2005-06 (page 214) the government accepted contingent liabilities of over one billion rupees on behalf of FFC Jordan. The foundation must be the only private entity whose liability the government thus owned. Is this not "undue favour"?

Asked whether the government questioned the FFC Jordan management about the sugar mills deal, Gen. Amjad said: "The Ministry of Defence had checked the issue and Fauji Foundation had replied to it." If it is okay for the Defence Ministry to question the "private entity," why is it not okay for the Parliamentary Committee to probe both the Foundation and the parent ministry?

The Foundation's boss claims that even the army chief had not questioned him about the sugar mills deal. Why should he cite the approval of the army chief as proof of sound management of what he claims is a "private entity"?

The Defence Ministry baffled everyone when, after ordering an inquiry into the sale of Khoski Sugar Mills, it took the position that Parliament had no right to quiz the foundation. But the chairman of the Senate committee mocked at himself and at Parliament when, accepting this position of the ministry, he cancelled the requisition.

In making this weird interpretation, the Foundation and the Ministries of Law and Defence seem to have ignored the verdict of the Supreme Court in the case of Fauji Foundation vs Shamimur Rehman. According to the verdict, "the Fauji Foundation is solely wedded for providing financial assistance to the serving as well as ex-servicemen of the Armed Forces, which cannot otherwise be but for the public welfare or public interest." (PLD 1983 SC 457)

Having been declared a "public welfare" organisation working in "public interest" by the Supreme Court and with the foregoing reasons, this interpretation can be advanced only by those who have only contempt for Parliament, the Constitution and the judiciary. It brings to mind what General Zia once said, "What is a Constitution? A mere 15-page document which I can tear at will."

To be fair, the Fauji Foundation director's illogical assertions can be explained away as a common human failing, and perhaps pardonable. Who would like to be questioned by those generally considered "ignorant and corrupt"? It takes great courage to step forward and engage in an eyeball-to-eyeball dialogue to clear one's name and reputation. It takes the humility of a saint to admit a mistake or misjudgement.

But the acceptance by the chairman of the Standing Committee of the Senate of the opinion of the government ministries without a moment's reflection, without regard to rules, without consultation and without demur is indeed most baffling. It signifies the shameful undercutting of Parliament by a member of Parliament.

"President Musharraf knows me and my integrity," says the Foundation's boss. When he was NAB chairman in 2000, The News had asked Gen. Amjad about evidence against the corrupt. The NAB will bring up charges, he had replied, adding: "The accused should prove himself innocent." (The News, April 24, 2000). Five years later, himself in the dock, he seems to think the President's endorsement has established his innocence and that Parliament is irrelevant.

He seems to think that Fauji Foundation is in adverse limelight simply because his detractors want to paint him black. "The Foundation will disappear from the newspapers after I relinquish charge in five months," he says. But since he was appointed managing director of the Foundation in April 2002, until April 21, 2005, when the bombshell was thrown in the National Assembly, no one talked of the Foundation.

The writer is a PPP Senator and member of the Defence Committee of the Senate
Email: drkhshan@isb.comsats.net.pk