NAB undertaking annual review of officers, bureaus

Body’s chief says they have launched inquiries against mega projects, govt bodies in past three months

The apex anti-corruption bureau in the country has started its annual process of evaluating the performance of officers across the country. This was disclosed in a statement issued by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Sunday. The statement read that NAB Chairman Justice (retd ) Javed Iqbal had started the evaluation process to judge the annual and mid-term performance of the accountability body’s officers. Under the evaluation system, the performance of NAB headquarters in Islamabad and regional bureaus across the country is being evaluated.

The evaluation process, the statement said, is expected to be completed in March later this year. Based on the evaluation, officers and bureaus will be informed about their strengths and weaknesses so that they can overcome their shortcomings and improve their performance. The NAB chief said that the bureau has also introduced computer-based monitoring and evaluation system. The system issues complaint numbers affixed to each complaint which helps to maintain the record and proper monitoring and evaluation of performance.   Justice Iqbal said that efforts were being made for enhancing the awareness and prevention campaign throughout the country to inform the people about the effects of corruption. He directed to multiply efforts for arresting absconders and proclaimed offenders. Moreover, joint efforts could be undertaken to eradicate corruption. Terming corruption a curse, Justice Iqbal said that NAB was geared up to come up to the expectations of the public and to eradicate corruption.

He added that NAB has perfected its procedures while its officers were working with the realization that eradication of corruption was their national duty. Highlighting its achievements, he said that NAB’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI) had decreased from 175 to 116. Moreover, Pakistan had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with China for eradicating corruption while the two countries were jointly working for ensuring transparency in the multi-billion-dollar ChinaPakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Further, Pakistan plans to sign a similar agreement with Malaysia, after gaining approval to build a modern training academy to train its investigation officers to investigate white collar and complicated cases more professionally and on a scientific basis.

Pointing out how NAB’s proactive anti-corruption strategy had started yielding positive dividends, having opened the bureaus’ doors for the public apart from fixing timelines for processing any corruption complaint, 10 months from complaint verification to filling a reference in the respective accountability. The policy is being implemented strictly to recover looted money from the corrupt, Justice Iqbal says, adding that they had recovered Rs288 billion and deposited it in national exchequer. Moreover, NAB’s conviction ratio was around 76 per cent. With a policy on arresting proclaimed offenders and absconders approved, as many as 15 proclaimed offenders had been arrested around the country in the past three months. Further, Justice Iqbal said that he had ordered to seek early hearing of 1,138 under-trial references in different accountability courts of the country so that an approximate Rs900 billion could be recovered from the corrupt and deposited in the national exchequer and culprits could be punished as per law.

The NAB chief added that he had also ordered inquiries into mega projects such as the Multan Metro Project, 56 public companies in Punjab, inquiry to fix responsibility in the destruction of the Pakistan Steel Mills and to include the names of the accused in the exit control list, inquiry into the alleged illegal allotment of industrial and Commercial plots by the Gwadar Industrial and Estate Development Authority, complaint verification against National Testing Service (NTS), illegal housing societies in Rawalpindi and Islamabad and other cities and an inquiry against the alleged corruption in various sporting bodies including the Pakistan Sports Board, the Pakistan Cricket Board and the Pakistan Hockey Federation.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 15^th, 2018.