KARACHI, Dec 17: Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) is expected to announce the names of secretaries for their provincial associations on Thursday.

According to sources, Sindh Football Association (SFA) has nominated five people for the job. They are Ali Mohammad, Shakoor Baloch, Hussain Bakhsh, Qamar Yar and Yaqoob Baloch of whom three — Ali, Shakoor and Hussain — are over 60 years of age. Besides, Shakoor Baloch works for the Pakistan Post Office and Qamar Yar is director of physical education at the University of Karachi. Meanwhile, Yaqoob Baloch, the youngest of the five candidates, is a knowledgeable football enthusiast and a small time coach and is currently jobless.

The position of paid secretary has been created in the provincial associations just as it was created within the PFF on the directive of Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). According to the constitution the association secretary — like the federation secretary — is required to run the secretariat as per the directions of the congress/executive committee and president.

The person selected for the job is also expected to fulfill a few other requirements including being well-educated and computer literate besides being associated with football at the national level and remaining active enough to be able to devote at least eight hours a day to his job.

In order for a person to fit in that criteria he should preferably not be past the retirement age. But it is rather disappointing to note that the SFA, which already has a president past the retirement age who unfortunately is even unable to speak due to his extensive health problems, would nominate another three people who are over 60 years of age as his right-hand man.

That leaves the KU physical education director Qamar Yar and Yaqoob Baloch as the two most eligible candidates for the job. However, one wonders if Qamar Yar would be able to devote eight hours a day to football while also keeping his government job.

Meanwhile, PFF Secretary Col (retd) Ahmed Yar Lodhi, while speaking to Dawn on Wednesday, said: “The PFF President Makhdoom Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat is the supreme authority here to decide on the association secretaries. Both he and myself will select the deserving persons after scrutiny of their bio data.”

When pointed out that the top three men were too old and the fourth one too busy to do justice to the job, leaving just one candidate Yaqoob Baloch as the most eligible one for the post, Lodhi said: “The SFA gave us the list according to their priority and Yaqoob’s name is right at the bottom. Still we will eliminate each candidate if the credentials of the following one are more impressive.”