A new beginning?: Watching over the accountability watchdog

Legislative hold sought over appointments to the Ehtisab Commission.

PESHAWAR:

The proposed Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) accountability law envisages legislative control of key appointments to the Ehtisab Commission that is to be set-up under the suggested law.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led coalition government is preparing to set up an accountability body at the provincial level and the draft of the K-P Ehtisab Commission bill was introduced to this effect at the last provincial assembly session. The bill is presently being reviewed by a select committee of the house.

The K-P Assembly speaker, in consultation with treasury and opposition benches, will constitute a legislative committee on governance and accountability. The 10-member committee will comprise five members each from treasury and opposition benches. The K-P Assembly speaker will chair this committee and the secretary of assembly will act as the secretary for the committee. The committee will reportedly have overarching powers in the appointment of commissioners for the accountability watchdog.



The bill is aimed at ensuring good governance at the provincial level by providing a correction mechanism to address failure or misconduct on the part of public office holders involved in corrupt practices such as misappropriation of property, receiving kickbacks and commissions.

The law will also provide a mechanism to recover government money and other assets from public officials.

‘Search and scrutiny’

The legislative committee has been asked to nominate commissioners for a search and scrutiny committee. Commissioners will be appointed for a single term of four years and will not be entitled to reappointment. At least one of the members of the search and scrutiny committee will be a woman. The committee members must not be government servants or office holders of political parties in order to be eligible for the position.

The search and scrutiny committee shall seek applications for the positions of commissioners through advertisements.

The search and scrutiny committee shall recommend, in accordance with the merit list, one name for each vacancy on the commission and the candidate with the highest score as Chief Ehtisab Commissioner.

These recommendations will also be laid before the public to solicit objections and comments.

The commission will also appoint a director general, prosecutor general, and director internal monitoring and public complaints.

After the bill is passed, it will repeal the West Pakistan Anti-Corruption Ordinance 1961. All cases pending with the Anti-Corruption Establishment along with all its employees and assets shall be transferred to this commission.

The bill proposes imprisonment up to five years for any person who fails to provide information to any commissioner or any other agency when required to do so, and imprisonment up to 10 years for providing false information or fabricating false evidence during an investigation.

The misuse of authority or power in committing any offence by a public office holder is punishable by rigorous imprisonment for a term which may extend to 14 years.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 19^th, 2013.