Govt ready for settlement over looted wealth

PM’s Special Assistant Akbar says he will visit Britain next week to discuss Dar’s extradition

ISLAMABAD: The government is ready to make settlement with those who had fled abroad with looted money, under accountability laws, says Prime Minister’s Special Assistant for Accountability Mirza Shahzad Akbar.

Akbar was speaking at the Press Information Department in Islamabad on Sunday. He was accompanied by PM’s Special Adviser Iftikhar Durrani.

Akbar told the media that the government allowed institutions to work independently which yielded positive results.

He said the government was restarting all investigations because the previous governments had not allowed the institutions like the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) and the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to work independently.

Calling NAB an independent institution, he said its performance had improved considerably through the efforts of Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal, the chairman.

Citing fake accounts in a money laundering case, the PM’s special assistant said that transactions worth billions of rupees were carried out under the names of rickshaw drivers and ice cream vendors. He said corruption in government projects and money laundering were interlinked.

Akbar announced that Pakistan had entered into an agreement with Britain. He said he would visit Britain next week and raise the issue of extraditing former finance minister Ishaq Dar with British officials.

About the Pakistani couple caught in London, he said their assets worth £12 million had been frozen. He said Pakistan would also file a case in this regard.

The PM’s special assistant said that an agreement with the Swiss government had been delayed for the past five years. According to him, $200 billion were stashed in Swiss banks.

“We need to make stricter FIA laws. We have also requested the German government to provide data on Swiss bank accounts,” he said. “We have information on more than 300 properties owned by Pakistanis in Dubai. Notices have been served on 895 other persons, some of whom have already applied for amnesty. We are reviewing this.”

Akbar said that the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was on to moving Pakistan from its grey list to black, and the previous government failed to take any steps. “We are improving coordination among institutions,” he claimed.

He came down hard on the previous governments for “making no efforts during the past 12 to 15 years” for recovering illegal assets.

“We shall complete all investigations, including the ones being carried out abroad. We will provide all possible cooperation to institutions for investigations,” he said.

The PM’s aide said Pakistan would also sign agreements with China and the UAE soon. There had been no effort to check siphoning of illegal money abroad, he alleged.

“Hundreds of cases have been discovered,” he said, adding that the LNG case was being investigated.

Speaking on the occasion, Durrani, the PM’s special adviser, said that Pemra should take action on fake news.

“We believe in freedom of the press and we are talking to journalist organisations. The names of Saad Rafiq and Salman Rafiq have not yet been placed on the ECL [exit control list], but some news report claimed the contrary,” he said, adding that news reports must first be authenticated before being aired or published.

And according to a Radio Pakistan report, Akbar has said that the government has finalised a mutual legal assistance law meant to obtain evidence from foreign jurisdictions about financial crimes involving Pakistanis.



The law, he said, would soon be placed before the cabinet and an ordinance would be promulgated in this regard before being presented in parliament. He added the legislation would empower NAB and the FIA to carry out investigations abroad.

According to Akbar, a bilateral treaty is again being ratified with the Swiss authorities, enabling the country to obtain details of bank accounts opened by Pakistani nationals. Pakistan, he said, had already signed a treaty with Britain which would help speed up investigations.

During another press conference, Akbar – flanked with Federal Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry – said the previous government had the knowledge of half the properties in both the countries, but it took no action.

Akbar said that an agreement had been signed with the British government for reopening corruption cases. “We are actively countering money laundering and identifying corruption in major projects,” he claimed.

He said that ratification of a treaty with the Swiss government for exchange of information had been intentionally delayed by the previous governments. The treaty, he added, should have been signed by 2013-14.

The PM’s aide said that public-sector entities were in pathetic conditions, adding that the PIA suffered a loss of Rs400 billion.

He said that Pakistan Railways and the Utility Store Corporation were also incurring losses. He claimed that the losses incurred by the public-sector entities had crossed Rs1 trillion.

Commenting on retrieval of the ill-gotten wealth from abroad, Akbar said that the government had formed a task force, comprising officials of the FIA, NAB and intelligence agencies.

“Matters pertaining to corruption are not limited to the FIA alone. A joint investigation team (JIT) is also looking into these cases,” he said. “Public sector deficit has exceeded Rs100 billion.”

 

With additional input from APP