Bureaucratic shuffle in petroleum division continues

ISLAMABAD: As part of the ongoing shake-up in the Petroleum Division, Haroon-ur-Rafique, a BS-21 officer of the Pakistan Administrative Service, has been made OSD and replaced by Sajid Mahmood Qazi, a BS-21 officer of the Secretariat Group, as additional secretary.

Qazi also served in the Petroleum Division as joint secretary. After being elevated to BS-21, he was appointed as senior joint secretary in the Finance Ministry. Notifications of both officers have been issued. “And this is how the shake-up at the bureaucratic level has got completed,” a senior official told The News.

This is the fourth change in the Petroleum Division at the higher bureaucratic level. Earlier, two joint secretaries of the Secretariat Group — Zakaria Ali Shah, BS-20, and Saira Najeeb, BS-20, in the Petroleum Division — had been made OSD. Captain (retd) Anwar-ul-Haq, a BS-19 officer of the Pakistan Administrative Service, working at the disposal of the Capital Development Authority, has taken the charge as joint secretary (admin) in the Petroleum Division with immediate effect. Captain (retd) Shahbaz Tahir Nadeem, a BS-19 officer of the Pakistan Administrative Service, working under the KP government, has also assumed office as joint secretary (development) in the Petroleum Division.

The new team has been given the task to meet the challenges the petroleum sector is facing since long. The challenges include the implementation of TPA rules for the private sector for the import of LNG and speedy resolution of issues pertaining to the future LNG terminals, utilization of underutilized and excess capacity of existing LNG terminals, making JJVL operational to increase local LPG production and constitution of BoD of SSGC, SNGPL, PLL, GHPL, PPL and OGDCL.