The federal government has removed Nausheen Amjad from the post of Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) chairperson, replacing her with Javed Ghani.
Amjad, a BS-22 officer of Inland Revenue Service (IRS), had in April been appointed as FBR chairperson after then chief Shabbar Zaidi could not continue his duties due to health conditions.
Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan had handpicked Zaidi as his man to achieve the goal of collecting Rs5.5 trillion in taxes during the previous fiscal year and Rs8 trillion by the end of his term.
Zaidi was good in policymaking but he could not handle the FBR’s operations well. The former chairman also could not appoint competent members at the top and transferred thousands of people of low ranks without replacing the top hierarchy.
His successor, Nausheen was the second woman to lead the organisation of 25,000 people and the fourth chairperson in the past 20 months.
The government had approved her appointment by having the federal cabinet circulate a summary instead of bringing the matter in a regular cabinet meeting.
Nausheen faced and her successor faces a gigantic task of stopping the nosediving tax revenues, restructuring the top FBR hierarchy and improving the tainted image of the tax machinery.
Ghani will also have to address the issue of rampant corruption, particularly fresh reports regarding some officers receiving kickbacks from taxpayers for putting their names on the list of those who will receive tax refunds on a priority basis under the PM’s COVID-19 relief package, and achieve targets set by the government in the new budget.
