Collective responsibility: Anti-corruption now part of development agenda

NAB chief urges citizens to play their part in combating corruption

ISLAMABAD: The fight against corruption has now been included in the development agenda of the country.

This was stated by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Chairman Qamar Zaman Chaudhry while addressing officials at the bureau’s headquarters on Saturday, a statement said.

He added that it was encouraging for the accountability body that the anti-corruption, for the first time, had been made a part of the development agenda in the country.

The Planning Commission, Chaudhry said, had included an entire chapter devoted to issues of corruption in its eleventh five-year plan. “We intend to work closely with the Planning Commission of Pakistan to achieve the goals set in the eleventh five-year plan for eradication of corruption.”

The NAB chief added that corruption was not only a vice in its own right, but it also triggered a chain reaction which leads to injustice and mistrust.

Talking about tackling corruption, he said that the body was essentially a complaint-driven organisation. NAB’s operational methodology had set three stages for case resolution including complaint verification, inquiry and investigation.

NAB’s officers need to follow a strict code of conduct and maintain a zero tolerance policy against the eradication of corruption on merit, Chaudhry added.

He urged the officers to conduct detailed introspection and analysis of organisational weaknesses, and overhaul procedures and business processes.

Chaudhry said that all pillars of the organisation including operations, prosecution, human resource development and awareness and prevention had been reactivated, adding that an effective accountability mechanism was quintessential for economic growth, investment and stability of social order.

“Transparency is a prerequisite for promoting investment and economic growth,” the NAB chief said.

He further explained that NAB had since its inception adopted an enforcement-based approach against corruption. Moreover, the special focus had been given to creating awareness, educating the public at large about the ill effects of corruption.

In this regard, he said NAB had laid special emphasis on the youth, setting up around 42,000 character building societies (CBS) in universities and colleges across the country.

Despite these efforts, Chaudhry said that fighting corruption was a challenging task and a collective social responsibility. He added that serious efforts to combat it had started with this realisation.

“We all are together in eradicating corruption,” he said.

NAB, Chaudhry said, was determined to make Pakistan corruption free. He urged citizens to make an effort to combat corruption by making their personal, professional and official conduct free from influence.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 15^th, 2017.