Lt Gen Amjad Shoaib elected as new president PESS

Mandi Bahauddin (Sher Gondal) : Pakistan Ex-Servicemen Society (PESS) elects its new office bearers.

In a meeting held at Flashmans Hotel Rawalpindi, Lt Gen Faiz Ali Chishti was elected as PESS Pattern in Chief, Lt Gen Amjad Shoaib as President, Maj Gen Javed Aslam Tahir as senior vice president and Maj Gen Ijaz Hussain Awan was elected as vice president.

After completion of elections, the new office bearers addressed the meeting and vowed to use their all capabilities to organize ex-servicemen at grossroot level and promote their welfare.

Lt Gen Amjad briefly touched upon external threats to the country and poor performance of national institutions to tackle with new emerging challenges. He said ex-servicemen are not the only members of PESS even their family members are part and parcel of this veteran’s organization.

He said armed forces performance in fighting terrorism and anti-social elements is exemplary and they have backing and support of public, He said ex-servicemen organized on PESS platform would play positive role in development of the country as they are more disciplined and law abiding citizens.

He said ex-servicemen are part of armed forces and they stand with their serving brethren. As such they and armed forces belong to same constituency.

District Presidents from Punjab, KPK and Sindh also spoke on the occasion. They said there was a dire need to make armed services board more active to resolve ex-servicemen and their widows’ problems relating to their welfare. They said several districts were without district armed services boards. Defense ministry should be reminded to establish DASB in these districts. Fauji foundation should also be asked to extend education and health facilities in remote areas keeping in view the strength of former and serving soldiers in such areas. Fauji Foundation should equip medical centers with modern facilities like x rays machine, blood testing lab and ultra sound machine to improve their service delivery, they demanded.

Meanwhile Abdullah Gul son of late Gen Hamid Gul emerged on the stage and enumerated his father’s services to the PESS when he was its president. He also desired to seek membership of the society. The house unanimously passed a resolution to grant him membership of PESS Executive Council.

Abdullah thanked the house and offered his one Kanal house for PESS office till PESS arranged its permanent office.

Election Committee headed by Col Sajid conducted elections proceedings while overall arrangements for the event were made by former acting president PESS Brig Abdul Raouf Malak.