Pending NAB cases

It took former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf no less than eight years to get an all-clear from an accountability court over charges of receiving kickbacks in a rental power agreement he okayed in April 2009 in his capacity as water and power minister. This is just one example of how cases have dragged on for years and years in the accountability courts — well, just like other trial courts — in the country. Court record shows that even cases that had been filed as far back in year 2000 have been pending with the accountability courts.

Under the National Accountability Ordinance 1999, corruption cases are supposed to be decided within a span of 30 days. However, due to a host of issues — like lack of judicial staff, untrained investigating officers, as well as political considerations — there have been inordinate delays in the settlement of the cases, mostly involving politicians and bureaucrats. No wonder, as many as 1,226 references are pending with a total of 25 accountability courts in the country — five of which have no presiding judge.

Thus, for a swift disposal of the mentioned cases, the Supreme Court has proposed another 120 accountability courts to be set up across the country. The proposal has come from a three-judge bench of the top court — headed by Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed himself — that had taken up a suo motu case regarding delay in trials before the accountability courts. With the addition of 120, a total of 145 accountability courts would be dealing with 1,226 cases — meaning between eight and nine cases for one judge. This will help clear the backlog of the cases within three months, as directed by the Supreme Court.

That the dispensation of justice in Pakistan is notoriously slow is no overstatement. But while justice delayed is justice denied, justice rushed is justice crushed. We have seen concerns expressed by legal experts over the model courts that had been set up on the orders of Justice Asif Saeed Khosa, the former CJP, to deal with a huge pendency of cases in the lower courts. There is thus the need to ensure that the quality of judgment is not compromised in the rush to dispose of the pending cases.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 10^th, 2020.

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