NAB freezes assets, puts on ECL 3 former federal Ministers, 6 PEPCO heads

NAB sends names of 19 individuals in first to be placed on ECL, freeze bank accounts.

LAHORE: After the Supreme Court cancelled rental power projects in the country on Friday, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has requested the Ministry of Interior to put the names of 19 accused including three former federal ministers, a former WAPDA chairman, five former federal secretaries, six heads of the Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO) and four concerned officials of the Gencos , NEPRA and PPIB in the Exit Control List (ECL), lest they escape from the country, sources familiar with the matter told The Express Tribune.

Among those whose names have been asked to be put on the ECL include former federal ministers for Water and Power Raja Pervez Ashraf, Liaqat Jatoi and former federal minister for finance Shaukat Tareen. Former WAPDA chairman Tariq Hameed.

Additionally the names of former federal secretaries of Water and Power and Finance including Salman Siddique, Shahid Rafi, Ashfaq Mehmood, Saeed Zafar, and Ismail Qureshi have been included. Meanwhile, the six PEPCO chiefs Anwar Khalid, Munawar Baseer, Tahir Basharat, Khalid Irfan, Fazal Khan, Saleem Arif have also been included in the list.

Four names of concerned officials from NEPRA, Gencos and PPIB have also been included in the list.

NAB authorities further claimed that they have informed Banks and concerned District Coordination Officers (DCOs), District Officers (Revenue) and other concerned authorities for freezing bank accounts of the accused and putting caution on the assets of 12 involved rental power companies.

Sources said that the decision to freeze bank accounts and putting names on the ECL was taken in a meeting held at NAB Headquarters in Islamabad on Monday. Chairman NAB Admiral (retd) Fasih Bokhari, the Deputy Chairman Javed Qazi, the Director General Operations as well as Special Operations Division Col. (retd) Shahzad Anwar Bhatti attended the meeting along with other concerned officials.

They also managed to get names of the owners, chief executives and agents of 12 rental power companies from the Ministry of Water and Power and Ministry of Finance, sources revealed.

NAB is currently working on a second list of names of owners, chief executive and agents of the 12 rental power companies, which will be sent to the Ministry of Interior on Tuesday for placing on the ECL.

However, FIA officials posted at different airports while talking to The Express Tribune said that they had so far received no written or verbal orders from the Ministry of Interior to stop the three former federal ministers, five former federal secretaries and six former PEPCO chiefs from travelling abroad.