LAHORE: The failure of National Transmission & Despatch Company’s (NTDC) board of directors to process pending promotion cases of senior officials led to the resignation of incumbent managing director, who was forced to resign instead of applying for a long leave to join his family due to unavoidable circumstances.
More than a half dozen promotion cases for the posts of general managers are lying with the board and remain unprocessed.
The promotion order of these senior position was used to be issued by the managing director up till early this year, said sources. However, these executive powers of MD were usurped by board without any justification, claimed sources. The powers of senior level postings were rested with the MD until early 2021; however, the board having no executive powers seized those powers due to reasons better known to them, an official said.
He added that promotions at the level of GMs were long overdue and there was frustration and anxiety among the senior management of NTDC due to no development in this regard. Unfortunately, the sources said the board willingly or unwillingly managed to block these promotions, while sitting on the files, freezing the whole process.
Had these promotions been processed, there would have been a senior setup at helm of affairs in the absence of MD, who wanted to join his family to deal with some personal issues, sources said.
According to sources, the proposal to offer outgoing MD to take leave instead of resigning could not be materialised as there was no senior management at top level to run the transmission utility, so this idea was dropped. Nonetheless, an official said, it would be unfortunate to let such a competent MD leave office in pathetic circumstances.
“It seems that the board is hell-bent on bulldozing every step taken in right direction,” he said adding that Azaz should have been given free hand to run NTDC as a dynamic entity.
“The MD should have been asked to continue work as he has the reputation of an honest and hard-working person, who has delivered in local challenging conditions while working with one of the global energy giants.” Sources were of the view the MD had been knocked down by the board on technical grounds. He could have joined his family on leave for a few months due to personal reasons had he been given a chance to formulate his team, the official added.
So, the sources claimed, in the absence of MD, no senior level group of officers was there to run the company effectively, thanks to alleged authoritarian board.
When contacted, the outgoing MD NTDC said he had to resign from the post of MD due to unavoidable circumstances requiring his immediate union with his family abroad.