Former cardiac surgeon appointed special assistant

PESHAWAR: At a time when the caretaker government has completed its three-month legal tenure, the provincial government on Friday appointed Dr Riaz Anwar, a former cardiac surgeon, as special assistant to caretaker chief minister on health.

He was earlier appointed as special assistant to the caretaker chief minister for sports and youth affairs, and was now given the additional charge of assistant to the CM on health. It is the first time the government has decided to run the two important departments, health and education, through assistants.

“The advisors and special assistants can’t exercise the power of ministers. The caretaker chief minister is overall head of the portfolios being run by the advisors and special assistants,” said a senior government official.

However, he added that the advisors and the special assistants can exercise the power of ministers in the case the chief minister transferred his powers to them. It was expected that a powerful figure in the Governor’s House was lobbying for Dr Riaz Anwar to get the portfolio of health and for that they forced a previous advisor to the chief minister, Prof Dr Abid Jameel to resign.

Well-placed sources close to the caretaker chief minister told The News that he had called Prof Abid Jameel and offered him another portfolio instead of health. “Since Dr Abid Jameel himself is a respected figure of this province and Pakistan’s most popular oncologist, he was aware of the conspiracy and chose to quit. He had told the chief minister that the only reason he had joined the caretaker government was to serve his people and wasn’t interested in any portfolios,” a sneer government official said on condition of anonymity.

He said the chief minister didn’t feel comfortable during that situation as he was helpless but he was happy for Dr Abid Jameel when he decided to quit rather than wasting time in the government.

The chief minister, according to sources, wanted Dr Abid Jameel to become his advisor for sports and youth affairs that he immediately rejected. Dr Abid Jameel had stopped any interference in his department and decided to do all transfers postings purely on merit.

“The moment he left, powerful and wealthy people started getting prized positions in the Health Department and its directorate,” the government official said. Dr Riaz Anwar is a former employee of the Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar. He was head of the Cardiac Surgery Department when a clinical audit was conducted that found him and his fellow doctors responsible for high mortality rate in their department.

The LRH Board of Governors (BoG), headed by Prof Nausherwan Burki, had no other option but to cease the cardiac procedures in the department and recommended Dr Riaz Anwar and his two fellow surgeons to improve their skills by getting training at the Armed Forces Institute of Cardiac Surgery (AFIC) in Rawalpindi.

It was a huge embarrassment for Dr Riaz Anwar being head of the department as there were reports that the mortality rate was 40 per cent in their department, but Dr Riaz Anwar and his colleagues had rejected the reports, saying there were multiple reasons for the high mortality rate including the poor infrastructure, lack of sterilised equipment being used in the procedures.

There was another version of the story as some of the doctors were of the view that since some of the faculty members including Dr Riaz Anwar had opposed the health reforms the way Dr Nausherwan Burki was trying to implement and had given tough time to him. Therefore, they alleged, Dr Burki and some of the faculty members opposed to Dr Riaz Anwar hatched a conspiracy to victimise them and get rid of them.

But no one denied the mortality rate in the cardiac surgery department of LRH those days. The BoG and the hospital administration had to shut the cardiac surgery department for more than two years after that scandal as patients refused to go to LRH then. Rather than opting for going to AFIC to get training and improve their skills, Dr Riaz Anwar chose to quit.

He then joined the Qazi Hussain Ahmad Medical Complex in Nowshera where his friend gave him a favour as since there was no cardiac surgery department, he was appointed as head of medical education.

Dr Riaz Anwar is stated to be an old friend of former chief minister and JUI-F leader Akram Durrani and then got close to Governor Ghulam Ali that enabled him to become part of the caretaker setup.