Self-accountability: NAB penalised 57 officers in two years

Accountability body set up prevention committees to help plug loopholes

ISLAMABAD: As part of self-accountability, as many as 57 officers of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) have been penalised over the past two-and-a-half years.

According to a statement released on Sunday, NAB Chairman Qamar Zaman Chaudhry said that the bureau body had set up an internal accountability mechanism (IAM).

The IAM, he said, had initiated disciplinary proceedings against 83 officials of the authority during the last two-and-a-half years. Of these, 61 cases were been finalised ascribing major penalties in 23 cases, minor penalties in 34 cases while exonerating officials in four cases.

Prevention committees

In order to plug loopholes in various government departments, NAB had set up prevention committees for various government departments.

This was stated by Chaudhry during a meeting to review the performance of the Awareness and Prevention Division of the authority at NAB Headquarters.

Chaudhry said that NAB had constituted the prevention committees to identify and suggest ways and means to plug loopholes and to take measures for improving and strengthening regulatory mechanism of federal and provincial governments for transparency, meritocracy, fair play and compliance with relevant laws.

In this regard, committees had been set up on Capital Development Authority (CDA), Ministry of Religious Affairs, Agriculture and National Food security, National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination, Federal Board of Revenue, and Press Information Department. Moreover, these committees were also constituted in provinces relating to health, education, revenue and housing, and cooperatives.

The committee on the Ministry of Religious Affairs forwarded its recommendations which the ministry then considered very aggressively to improve facilities and address problems of Hajis.

Chaudhry added that NAB had chalked out a proactive anti-corruption strategy to eradicate corruption. During the last 16 years, he said NAB had received around 326,694 complaints from individuals and organisations, both public and private.

During this period, NAB authorised 10,992 complaint verifications, 7,303 inquiries, 3,648 investigations, filed 2,667 corruption references with the respective accountability courts. The overall conviction ratio stood at around 76 per cent.

The NAB chief said that the accountability body’s prime focus was on cases of cheating the public at large by fraudulent financial companies, bank frauds, wilful defaults of bank loan, misuse of authority and embezzlement of state funds by government servants.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 30^th, 2017.