KARACHI: Former national skipper Aamir Sohail was unprecedentedly handed two key posts on Tuesday when the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) appointed him as chairman of the national selection committee as well as director game development.

The decision to this effect was actually taken on Monday at the 28th meeting of the governing board of the PCB, headed by board chairman Zaka Ashraf. But the announcement, made through a PCB media release, was deferred until Tuesday.

According to the media release, the 47-year-old Aamir who also served as chief selector — after Pakistan’s first-round exit at the 2003 World Cup in southern Africa during the tenure of Lt Gen Tauqir Zia who headed the PCB from late 1999 to December 2003 — would also oversee the working of the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Lahore.

According to the PCB media release, Aamir’s vision and experience will help build a strong Pakistan side for the World Cup 2015.

Former Test batsman Mohammad Ilyas, who was initially mentioned in the cricketing circles as favourite for the post, will now head the secondary selection committee of the PCB which will be responsible of picking the Pakistan ‘A’, Pakistan Under-19 and the national women’s teams.

According to reliable sources, the sudden elevation of Aamir to fill the void created by the departure of two-time chairman of selectors Iqbal Qasim in July last year, has come as a major development in Pakistan cricket.

A few month ago, Moin Khan, another ex-Pakistan skipper, was named chief selector by the then interim chairman of PCB, Najam Sethi, to replace Iqbal but was removed when the Islamabad High Court (IHC) overruled all the key decisions taken by Sethi.

The PCB, then functioning under a five-member Interim Management Committee (IMC) headed by Sethi after the IHC decision to suspend the now reinstated Zaka Ashraf as the board chairman, chose to name Moin as the successor to Naveed Akram Cheema as the Pakistan team manager, a position Moin held during the series against Zimbabwe, South Africa and Sri Lanka recently.

Ilyas, who worked as the interim chief selector when former opener Mohsin Khan was asked to take over as Pakistan coach in October 2011, reportedly was appointed as the chairman of selector late last month according to sources who further pointed out that even his appointment letter was ready to be delivered but a senior PCB official withheld the document because of some personal grudge.

Zaka, meanwhile, confirmed to another source that the appointment of Aamir, who appeared in 47 Tests and 156 One-day Internationals from 1991-92 until 2000, was one of the major changes approved by the governing body on Monday.

“Aamir being an experienced contender is the best man to carry our plan because we are keen on adopting an aggressive stance on unearthing talent from our domestic cricket,” Zaka said. “Moreover, we have now decided to revive the national academies with Aamir at the helm in addition to his responsibility of heading the national selection committee.”

It is pertinent to mention that the outspoken Aamir, who has flirted with controversies over the years and was sacked as Pakistan captain at midnight during Khalid Mahmood’s regime in late 1998, also served as game development director in 2009 when Ijaz Butt was the PCB chairman before opting to quit citing lack of activity.

During his first tenure as chief selector in 2003, Aamir was credited for inducting several youngsters in the national senior team to replace the likes of stalwarts such as Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis and Saeed Anwar, who all led Pakistan, to name a few.

But some of Aamir’s selections were also questionable, notably that of Tauqir Zia’s son Junaid Zia who was reported to the International Cricket Council (ICC) for a suspect bowling action during the Under-19 World Cup in 2002 — for four One-day Internationals against Bangladesh in 2003.

In his first key decision as chief selector, Aamir has pledged to continue with the three long-serving members of the outgoing selection panel — Saleem Jaffer, Azhar Khan and Farrukh Zaman — in order to maintain continuity in the selection process.

Saleem, the former Test fast bowler, has been a regular member of the selection since 2007 — the year when the vastly experienced Salahuddin Ahmed ‘Sallu’, was placed in the ‘hot seat’ of chief selector for the second time.

Sallu was credited with the selections of Saeed Ajmal and Abdur Rehman as well as the revival of the Misbah-ul-Haq’s international career.

Aamir’s foremost assignment will be to pick the Pakistan’s limited-overs teams for the upcoming Asia Cup in Bangladesh and the ICC World Twenty20 in Bangladesh next month.

In other key decisions taken at Monday’s meeting, ex-Pakistan captain Intikhab Alam would continue to be the director of domestic cricket, while former Test batsman Basit Ali, who was a member of the junior selection committee from 2008 to 2009, has been appointed as coach of the PCB Regional Cricket Academy in Karachi to hunt and nurture talent in the south region of the country.