NAB approves inquiries into mega corruption cases

Bureau chief says some housing societies exist only on paper lacking proper approval

ISLAMABAD: An Executive Board meeting (EBM) of National Accountability Bureau (NAB), chaired by NAB Chairman Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal, on Tuesday authorised a comprehensive investigation into the mega sugar and wheat scandals.

A statement issued after the meeting said that the EBM also authorised the conducting of two inquiries against the officers/officials of the Capital Development Authority (CDA), management of River Garden Housing Society and inquiries of mega corruption cases in the Pakistan Petroleum Limited (PPL).

The EBM accorded approval of sending the complaint verification against management of International Islamic University and others to relevant department as per law. “The EBM okayed conducting comprehensive investigations of prime mega scam of wheat and sugar, including looting, price hike, smuggling and subsidy on sugar as per law,” the statement said.

The EBM approved closing inquiries against officers/officials of the Privatisation Commission of Pakistan and others, Justice (retd) Malik Muhammad Qayyum, former attorney general of Pakistan and others, Prof Dr Ikramullah Khan and others, managing committee of the Interior Employees Cooperative Housing Society, Raja Ali Akbar and others, owing to lack of evidence.

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The EBM was attended by NAB deputy chairman, prosecutor general, accountability, director general operations and other senior officers.

Addressing the meeting, Justice (retd) said that NAB believed in “corruption-free Pakistan”.

“NAB always believes in concentrating on merits of case sans caring about the face behind the case and taking it to the logical conclusion,” he said. “NAB’s priority is to eradicate corruption from the country, recover the looted amount from the plunderers and taking mega corruption white collar cases to logical conclusion, besides returning people’s hard-earned money looted by fake/illegal housing cooperative societies.”

According to the NAB chairman, under the present management, the graft-buster had filed 610 corruption references in various accountability courts during the last two years and recovered a record Rs178 billion from corrupt elements.

The performance of NAB has already been acknowledged by reputed international organisations including the World Economic Forum. At present, 1,275 corruption references having accumulated value of Rs943 billion are under trial in various accountability courts.

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The NAB chairman urged the people and regulators to play their role in checking the mushroom growth of illegal housing societies. He asked the media to confirm authenticity, including availability of land, approval of layout plan and NOC from relevant regulator, of a housing society before printing/ broadcasting the advertisement campaign.

“This is essential as some housing societies exists only on papers and they do not have approval from the relevant regulator. Despite that they succeed in looting people due to their attractive advertisements.

The chairman directed the directors general to take complaint verifications, inquiries and investigation within the prescribed timeframe. He directed investigation officers, prosecutors to pursue the cases with complete preparation, collect concrete evidence so that the corrupt elements could be punished.