NAB’s anti-corruption drive helped recover Rs538b: chairman

ISLAMABAD: Chairman National Accountability Bureau Justice (Retd) Javed Iqbal said the bureau’s anti-corruption strategy proved successful resulting in the recovery of Rs538 billion from corrupt elements during the tenure of the present management.

Chairing a meeting to review the performance of NAB’s Operations and Prosecution Divisions here Monday, Justice (Retd) Javed Iqbal said the Father of the Nation Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah in his address to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan had termed corruption and bribery one of the biggest curses. “That really is a poison. We must put it down with an iron hand,” he said, adding that the NAB was established to eradicate corruption in a holistic and integrated manner as NAB strongly believes in zero tolerance in eradicating 100%corruption.

He said that NAB was committed to rooting out corruption with an iron hand in an atmosphere of renewed energy and dynamism, where fighting against corruption is being taken as a national duty.

During the meeting, it was informed by DG Operations that NAB had received 496,460 complaints since its inception, out of which 487,124 were disposed of. He told the committee that NAB has authorized 16,093 Complaint Verification (CVs), while 15,378 Complaint Verifications were completed. He told the committee that NAB has authorized 10,241 inquiries, out of which 9,275 inquiries have been completed, authorized 4,654 investigations, out of which 4,358 investigations have been completed. It was informed that it had recovered Rs. 819.793b directly and indirectly since its inception, which is a record achievement.

It was further informed that NAB had filed 3754 references in various learned accountability courts, out of which 2477 references were decided by learned accountability courts. Currently, 1274 references having worth Rs. 1335.019b were under trial at various accountability courts.

Justice (Retd) Javed Iqbal said that NAB is considered a role model among Saarc countries. “Due to which NAB was selected as the first Chairman of Saarc anti-corruption forum and the NAB is the focal Department of Pakistan under UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC),” he said.

He said: “NAB has signed an MOU with China to oversee CPEC projects being conducted in Pakistan. It has introduced a new concept of Combine Investigation Team (CIT) to benefit from the experience and wisdom of senior supervisory officers to improve the standard and quality of inquiries having solid evidence and statements of witnesses and documentary evidence, besides establishing the Forensic Science LAB which has facilities of Digital Forensics, Questioned Documents and Fingerprint analysis. These initiatives of NAB are lending quality.”

“NAB has signed MoU with Higher Education Commission to enlighten the youth about the ill effects of corruption in universities and colleges at an early age.” Under this initiative, he said, the NAB has successfully established more than 50 thousand character building societies in various universities and colleges besides constituting prevention committees in consultations with respective provincial and federal government departments to identify and plug loopholes in checking corruption. He said that as per Gillani and Gallup survey, 59 per cent of people have shown trust in NAB.

Justice (Retd) Javed Iqbal maintained that reputed national and international organizations like Transparency International (TI) Pakistan, World Economic Forum, Global Peace Canada, PILDAT and Mishal Pakistan have appreciated NAB for eradicating corruption. “The bureau has devised a comprehensive Quantified Grading System to improve the performance of Headquarters and all Regional Bureaus. Under Quantified Grading System, NAB Headquarters and Regional Bureaus are being evaluated on the annual and midterm basis at a given criterion which has proved successful in boosting the performance of NAB.”