Eliminating corruption holistically

NAB is Pakistan’s apex anti-corruption organisation. It is charged with the responsibility of eliminating corruption through a holistic approach of awareness, prevention and enforcement. It operates under the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) 1999. Pakistan, in the last 20 years, has achieved its best Corruption Perception Index issued by Transparency International. Besides, Pakistan is facing governance issues that mainly have to do with greed for ill-gotten wealth, which is a result of manipulating the system where discretions provide opportunities. In order to fulfil desires, corruption spreads as an epidemic disease with rampant weakening institutions.

The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) was established on November 16, 1999. NAB has its headquarter in Islamabad while it has seven regional offices, i.e., Regional NAB Karachi, Regional NAB Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Regional NAB Lahore, Regional NAB Rawalpindi, Regional NAB Balochistan, Regional NAB Multan and Regional NAB Sukkur.

The disastrous impact of unending greed led to the promulgation of NAO in November 1999. NAB derives its legal mandate from the NAO of 1999 which is extended to the whole of Pakistan, including Fata and Gilgit-Baltistan. The NAO mandated NAB to adopt a three-pronged strategy for curbing corruption in the country. Besides awareness and prevention, the enforcement strategy has given emphasis on creating deterrence among functionaries to check indulgence in the acts of corruption. The NAO, with its overriding effect, has been effective in handling corrupt elements and recovering proceeds from criminal activities. Therefore, the NAO, in its entirety, has been ranked as the best anti-corruption law and is being replicated in other countries.

NAB’s enforcement operations start functioning on the receipt of a written complaint or information received by NAB about an alleged act of corruption or corrupt practices as defined under Section 9. The process is initiated with verification of the contents of the information received and the applicability of the provisions of law. This process is called Complaint Verification wherein the complainant is called for confirming the status and evidence available with him. Once it is determined that the alleged offence falls under the NAO and available material justifies further processing, the same is processed for subsequent action. In the second step, inquiry under Section 18 of the NAO is authorised to confirm the committal of the offence and the collection of evidence to identify the alleged person(s) involved.

Once a criminal case is established and the accused is unable to return the embezzled resources, inquiry is converted into investigation under Section 18(C) to finalise the collection of evidence for the filing of a reference or challan in the respective accountability court and to prosecute him with the objective of conviction and confiscation of the proceeds of crime. During the investigation, the accused is provided the opportunity to confront the evidence collected. The accused has the option of plea bargain at this stage and return illegal gains to avoid trial and imprisonment.

The enforcement strategy of NAB starts with a soft initiative of fact-finding without blaming any person for an alleged act of corruption. The process moves with simple explanations from the complainant to clarify the charges against the accused and to confirm his position with material evidence, if any. On the other hand, during inquiry, the collection of evidence vis-a-vis the allegations, are verified with the explanations given by the accused person and statements recorded from witnesses. If the stated version of the accused is found implausible, the matter moves towards the option of accepting guilt and offering for the voluntary return of assets or gain, which were acquired as a consequence of an offence committed under the NAO. Failing at this stage, with the availability of cogent evidence, the investigation proceedings may causes arrest of the accused with the option of plea bargain.

Matters concerning placement on the exit control list, issuance of red notices against absconding accused, requests for mutual legal assistance from foreign jurisdictions and extradition of fugitives from law rest with the NAB headquarters. All these matters, along with the operational powers not falling under the category of delegations, are exercised by the NAB chairman on the recommendation of Operations and Prosecution Divisions of NAB.

NAB has resolved to do across-the-board accountability in an objective and impartial manner. Inquiries and investigations have been initiated against all those against whom credible and corroborative evidence is available without any political or personal malice.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 7^th,  2015.

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