The Sindh government and the MQM have been criticising law enforcement action against their leadership and have demanded that the administrative control of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) be handed over to the provincial government. To understand the legalities of this demand, Dawn spoke to Raja Amir Abbas Hassan, a senior lawyer and former NAB deputy prosecutor general.

Q: Can NAB and the FIA be placed under the control of any provincial administration?

A: Both NAB and the FIA are statutory organisations. NAB was formed under the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) and the FIA was established under the FIA Act, 1974. Being the apex anti-corruption body on the country NAB is not even under the control of any federal entity. The FIA, however, works under the Ministry of Interior. Therefore, they cannot be ‘franchised’ to provincial governments. Provincial governments have their own departments, such as the Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE), to deal with such cases.

Q: When the ACE is working in Sindh, why is NAB taking action in the province?

A: Under the statute, NAB had established regional offices in different provinces. Under the NAO, the prime objective of the bureau is to recover ill-gotten monies, not to make arrests or put corrupt elements behind bars. The ACE deals with small-scale corruption. For example, if a police constable takes a bribe, then his offence would not come into the ambit of NAB as the ACE would register cases against him and put him on trial before the Anti-Corruption Courts.

However, NAB deals with mega corruption cases. What the provincial government can do is point out corrupt officials and government functionaries to NAB and ask the bureau to take action against them. But in case the provincial government does not identify any corrupt practices, NAB has its own mechanism in place to do so.

Q: Can Rangers arrest any accused for charges related to corruption, money laundering and financial embezzlement?

A: The federal or provincial governments deploy the Rangers in aid of the civil administration. Under certain circumstances, Rangers officials are given police powers to raid suspected premises, arrest and detain suspects and register FIRs against them.

The Protection of Pakistan Act (PoPA) empowers the Rangers or any other law enforcement agencies to detain any suspect for 90 days. They can register more than one FIR against any suspect.

For example, if a person is facing money laundering charges related to terror financing, Rangers can detain such an individual under PoPA despite the fact that money laundering is a scheduled offence under the FIA Act.

A simple money laundering case may be referred to FIA. Similarly, a financial embezzlement case may also be transferred to NAB.

Under section 16 of the NAO, NAB has the power to transfer a case from any other trial courts to its jurisdiction if the bureau believes that the offence falls under the offences within its purview.

Published in Dawn, September 16th, 2015

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