Notification to appoint Syed Asghar Haider as NAB prosecutor general issued

ISLAMABAD: The ministry of law and justice on Wednesday issued a notification to appoint Syed Asghar Haider as the new prosecutor general of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).

The law ministry had submitted a summary to the president in this regard on Tuesday.

“The President of Islamic Republic of Pakistan has been pleased to appoint Justice (retd) Syed Asghar Haider as Prosecutor General Accountability, National Accountability Bureau, with effect from the date he assumed the charge,” reads the notification.



The impasse between the anti-graft watchdog and the federal government came to an end with the appointment of Justice Haider as the new NAB prosecutor general.

Justice Haider was among those Lahore High Court judges who had taken oath under November 3, 2007 provisional constitutional order that was promulgated by General (retd) Pervez Musharraf.

The post was vacant since November last year when the three-year tenure of former prosecutor general Waqas Qadeer Dar ended. Under the law, federal government should appoint prosecutor general NAB in consultation with the NAB chairman.

Chairman NAB Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal had sent a list of five lawyers to the federal government to choose from. Names of Mudhasir Khalid Abbasi, Shah Khawar, Syed Asghar Haider, Fasihul Mulk, and Nasir Saeed Sheikh were proposed.
However, the president earlier rejected all names and sent three additional names to the chairman to select from. The president recommended Ramzan Chaudhry, Najeeb Faisal and Waqar Hassan Mir for the post but were rejected by NAB chairman.



The Supreme Court had already taken notice over the delay in the appointment of NAB prosecutor general and sought a concise statement from the Law Secretary over the delay in the appointment of recently vacated post during a hearing on Tuesday.

However, it is learnt that the Attorney General Ashtar Ausaf Ali played a pivotal role in bringing an end to the deadlock and held meetings with different quarters to reach out a consensus.