Sindh PA panel again summons DG NAB Sindh over ‘unfair’ comments

KARACHI: The Sindh Assembly’s Committee on Rules of Procedures and Privileges has again summoned the director general of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in Sindh, Altaf Bawany, to appear before it on August 24 on a complaint related to his alleged "unfair" televised comments about MPAs on the issue of the National Accountability Ordinance.

The committee, which met on Wednesday with Parliamentary Affairs Minister Nisar Ahmed Khuhro in the chair, expressed its resentment that the NAB director general did not appear before the body.

The meeting was held on the complaint of ruling PPP MPA Ghulam Qadir Chandio regarding the televised comments of the NAB official about the “intentions” of members of the provincial assembly regarding the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) 1999. The secretary of the Sindh Assembly informed the meeting that the NAB official could not appear owing to his preoccupation with different cases being heard by courts.

Khuhro said that the NAB official should have appeared before the committee as the meeting had been scheduled to begin at 2pm, and by that time the official should have become available. He said the NAB official did not adopt due procedures to duly apologise to the committee on his uncalled-for remarks regarding the MPAs.

He said the committee would be left with no option other than deciding the matter without further hearing the official in case he again chose to stay away from its meetings. Law Minister Ziaul Hassan Lanjar, who also attended the meeting, said the NAB official should have informed the meeting in writing about his preoccupation with court cases. 

The next meeting of the house committee on rules of procedure and privileges will be held at 3pm on August 24, 2017. Later, talking to journalists, Khuhro said the Sindh Assembly had the prerogative to adopt any legislation for accountability. He said the opposition political parties were equally right to move the court against such legislation. He said it was yet to be seen what the court would decide on the law recently passed by the provincial assembly.