The Supreme Court of Pakistan rejected Arshad Malik’s appeal to be reinstated as chief executive of PIA - Pakistan International Airlines (PK, Islamabad International) on January 21, arguing among other things that he had been appointed temporarily, The Nation newspaper reported.
A three-member bench at the court, headed by Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmad, allowed the airline's board of directors to run the carrier instead.
A former deputy chief of staff and air marshal in the Pakistan Air Force, Malik was appointed PIA chief executive in April 2019 by the federal government. The Supreme Court judges questioned his appointments to the flag carrier of two air vice-marshals, four air commodores, three wing commanders, and one flight lieutenant, and “running the national airline’s affairs like those of a family business”. They also expressed concern over rising fares.
As previously reported, earlier this month Malik challenged a Sindh High Court ruling that prevented him from performing his duties, arguing that he had been lawfully appointed chief executive. A petition challenging his position had been filed in December by Safdar Anjum, general secretary of the airline’s Senior Staff Association (SASA), warning that Malik lacked relevant education and experience for the job.
Malik told the Supreme Court that before his PIA appointment he had been responsible for the budget, flight safety, training, and public relations of the Pakistan Air Force (Islamabad Benazir Bhutto International).
In related news, PIA spokesperson Abdullah Hafeez announced on January 22 that services to New York were likely to commence in May 2020, pending approval by the United States’ Transportation Security Administration (TSA), local media reported.
The airline currently operates three routes between Pakistan and North America, all of them to Toronto Pearson, from Karachi International (2x weekly), Lahore International (2x weekly), and Islamabad International (1x weekly), according to the ch-aviation capacities module.
Up until October 2017, PIA operated a 2x weekly service to New York JFK from Karachi via Lahore and Manchester International. The US city had been served for over 50 years, and the carrier has also operated to Chicago O'Hare and Houston Intercontinental on similar European transiting services in the past.
A TSA team is expected in Pakistan early in February to carry out a “second-level” inspection. Hafeez assured that the Pakistani authorities would conduct security checks on passengers at airports in accordance with US requirements.
