Mandviwala warns NAB officials of their media trial

ISLAMABAD: Deputy Chairman Saleem Mandviwala warned in the Senate on Monday that now every officer of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) would face the media trial, as the issue of politicians’ witch-hunting was not coming to an end.

He said, “People are leaving the country and are worried that NAB may run their news stories any time and the notices issued to them will be run on the channels.

“This matter is not coming to an end, rather growing. So, I tell the government officials we will seriously consider the issue and end it as soon as possible.”

He said it had been reported in the newspapers that the media trial of NAB was taking place. “It was an interesting thing, because the media trial of people was going on till today. Now the media trial of NAB has started.

“I tell today and 10, 50 and 100 people will participate in the media trial and it will continue to grow with the passage of time," he added.

“I went to the house of Brigadier (retd) Asad Munir, and I met his daughter and widow. The way they cried and described his condition, I could hardly control my emotions.

“According to the statistics that have come in, the number of suicides in the custody of NAB is higher than the number of deaths,” he added.

He noted that Asad Munir was a brigadier in the army and was awarded Sitara-e-Imtiaz. He survived the first suicide. But in the second attempt, he hanged himself.

Mandviwala said, “Now forget that only people will have a media trial; now there will be a NAB trial, every NAB officer will have a trial and we will hold a trial in the media with the name of every NAB officer. We'll see what happens later.”