FIA investigation: Senate panel refers bank privatisation to NAB

Governor State Bank says its inquiry report would also be handed over to NAB

ISLAMABAD: The Senate Standing Committee on Rules of Procedure and Privilege on Friday directed the governor of State Bank to refer the matter pertaining to investigation into the privatisation of Muslim Commercial Bank (MCB) to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for further probe.

Chairman of the committee Senator Tahir Hussain Mashhadi also directed the concerned NAB to make an FIA investigation report on the issue a part of the investigation and submit its inquiry report till February 15.

The issue was earlier referred to the privilege committee after finance ministry had provided incorrect information to two questions asked in the Senate regarding number of companies privatised. The questions were raised by Senator Saeed Ghani, on whose motion the committee meeting was called.

During a previous meeting, the committee was informed by two federal secretaries that the government has no record of any probe being conducted into privatisation of the MCB. Chairman NAB had informed the committee that inquiry into the privatisation of MCB was closed and handed over to the State Bank on the directives of the former prime minister Shaukat Aziz in 2004, then finance minister. Hence no record is available with the NAB.

Senator Saeed Ghani had said that finance ministry had provided a list of 19 privatised institutions and NAB had probed into the privatisation process of these institutions, but the finance ministry did not disclose the name of MCB in its information. He said it shows that finance ministry had provided false and incomplete information to the house.

The State Bank official stated that under the banking law, the State Bank could not probe the MCB’s privatisation issue. To this, Senator Ghani requested the committee chairman to refer the matter to NAB if SBP cannot conduct a probe.

Governor State Bank Ashraf Mehmood Wathra, though, said the State Bank has compiled an inquiry report on MCB privatisation. He said the report would be handed over to NAB, admitting it has not been referred to any other department yet. He said that the inquiry report is comprehensive and there is no need to further investigate the matter and NAB could take action in light of the report.

The governor said FIA had also probed into the MCB privatisation issue in 1990s and these reports could also be helpful for further investigation. On this, Ghani said it is another false statement by the finance ministry, which had earlier stated that FIA had not inquired into the matter.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 27^th, 2014.