NAB denies giving clean chit to KP chief minister in scam

Published December 19, 2018
Officials term KP CM Mehmood Khan’s statement before investigators ‘unsatisfactory’ and say he may be summoned again. — File photo
Officials term KP CM Mehmood Khan’s statement before investigators ‘unsatisfactory’ and say he may be summoned again. — File photo

ISLAMABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has rejected a claim of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mehmood Khan that the anti-graft watchdog has given him “a clean chit” in a scam related to leasing of 275 acres of land in Malam Jabba hill station for establishing a ski/chairlift and hotel project.

“NAB has not given any clean chit to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mehmood Khan in Malam Jabba land leasing case,” a spokesman for NAB said in a press release issued by the bureau’s headquarters on Tuesday.

Not only the incumbent chief minister, but former chief minister and sitting federal Defence Minister Pervez Khattak and Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Principal Secretary Azam Khan were also allegedly involved in the scam.

The NAB spokesman clarified that Mehmood Khan’s claim about getting a clean chit in the scam made during a media talk was not true. He went on to say that the statement recorded by the KP chief minister in NAB Peshawar office was “unsatisfactory” and he may be asked to appear before the NAB investigators again.

“The statement of Mehmood Khan before joint investigation team of NAB, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, was unsatisfactory. Mehmood Khan could be summoned again any time in the same case,” the spokesman added.

Spokesman says Mehmood Khan’s statement before investigators was ‘unsatisfactory’ and he may be summoned again

The land of Malam Jabba was gifted by the Wali of Swat and the move to lease out the land was made in 2014. However, after smelling rat in the deal, the forest department had later cancelled the lease.

The KP chief minister had on Monday appeared before NAB Peshawar and then claimed that he had been given a clean chit in the case of lease of 275 acres of Malam Jabba’s forest land to a private firm during the previous government’s tenure.

He had claimed that it was his “first and last appearance before NAB” in this case.

He said that he had not been charged directly in any case and that he had been summoned in the capacity of a former provincial minister. “I was not aware about the lease nor had I signed any order allowing the lease,” the chief minister claimed.

A letter of PM’s Principal Secretary Azam Khan as former secretary of tourism, which is available with Dawn, revealed that the lease period of 33 years and extendable for another 20 years was mentioned in the advertisement as well as terms of reference (ToR) of the project.

Moreover, the ToR of the project had been approved by the chief minister (Pervez Khattak) on Feb 27, 2014. On the basis of this, private parties submitted their bids/proposals for obtaining the project to a committee notified by the chief secretary.

The letter said it must be presumed that the committee and the chief minister decided the present lease period as a special case despite general government policy on leasing as mentioned by the law department due to special circumstances of militancy-hit Malakand division and quantum of investment involved. “It is also worth mentioning that the highest bidder has offered Rs12 million per annum with enhancement of 10 per cent yearly during the initial lease period of 33 years with maximum 25 per cent increase for further extension,” the letter said.

It said the establishment and operationalisation of the project involved hundreds of millions of rupees of private sector’s investment and was the very first project near completion that had been initiated jointly by the Board of Investment and Trade of KP and the departments concerned.

“I do not think any private investor would invest such huge amounts in tourism projects of terrorism-hit Khyber Pakh­tun­khwa for a short lease period of 15 years,” Azam Khan had said in the letter. The letter added that the existing leasing process of Malam Jabba ski/chairlift and hotel project took almost six months to reach its current status and change in the lease period at that stage might sabotage the leasing process.

Published in Dawn, December 19th, 2018

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