KP hockey seeking justice from court: Zahir

ISLAMABAD: Khyber Pakhtu-nkhwa Hockey Association Secretary Zahir Shah has said that moving the court of law to seek justice was never his body’s first option.

He said sports organisations could only succeed if they worked within their constitutional framework.Talking to ‘The News’ following Wednesday’s development that saw the Peshawar High Court issuing bailable warrants of responded No 2 (PHF president), Zahir felt sorry for the legal battle.

KP hockey officials have filed a case against the PHF for violating the federation’s constitution.“It’s a really sad day for Pakistan hockey and I feel sorry that the matter that should have been settled on the table is now being decided by the court of law.

“Moving court had never been my first option. I did all I could in the last two and a half years to settle the matter through talks but to no avail.”He said if the Pakistan Hockey Federation was being run according to the constitution in the last two or so years, there would have been no reason for any difference.

“KP hockey officials did all they could to make the top PHF official realise that things were not being run according to the constitution. In fact, the PHF secretary never bothered to fulfill constitutional requirements and was doing things that were against the constitution.”

Zahir alleged that money was spent to try and raise parallel district and provincial associations against the elected bodies, which was against theconstitution.The KP hockey official also claimed that gross violations of financial rules were carried out in the PHF offices, especially in the period when the president was absent because of ailment.

Zahir added that it was also unjust when three KP Under-16 teams were asked to return from Khairabad (Sindh) when they reached there for the National Junior Championship. “There were also some issues in the Inter-Provincial Games that we won.”

According to Zahir, the matter became worse when KP was left out of the PHF executive board’s meeting on August 10.“Then we decided enough is enough and moved the court to seek justice,” he said.