ISLAMABAD: The joint sitting of two houses of the parliament will be held on Monday, apparently to pass the National Accou­ntability Bill, 2023, which was returned unsigned by President Dr Arif Alvi.

According to an announ­cement of the National Assembly Secretariat (NAS) on Sunday, the joint sitting will take place at 4pm to discuss the 19-point agenda, including the accountability bill.

President Alvi had returned the National Acc­o­untability (Amend­ment) Bill, 2023, on April 30, to the parliament, stating that previous amendments to the accountability laws were sub judice before the Supreme Court.

Last month, the bill, dubbed “part two of NRO-2” by the opposition, had sailed through the Senate without being referred to the standing committee concerned.

The legislation, proposed by the government in March, not only empowers the NAB chairman to transfer graft cases involving corruption of less than Rs500 million to the relevant agency, authority or department but also closes pending inquiries and investigations where they think no case is made out.

An amendment to Section 4 of the NAB law states: “If the chairman is satisfied that no case is made out against an accused and the investigation may be closed, he shall refer the matter to the court for approval and for the release of the accused, if in custody.

“Where the chairman is of the opinion that prima facie the case is made out against an accused under any other law for the time being in force, he shall refer the matter to the relevant agency, authority or department, as the case may be,” the amendment further states.

Under a provision added to Section 6 of the NAB Ordinance, as and when the office of the NAB chairman falls vacant or when the chairman is absent or unable to perform functions of his office — due to any reason whatsoever — the deputy chairman shall act as the NAB chairman and in the absence of deputy chairman, the federal government shall appoint an acting chairman from amongst the senior officers of NAB.

The bill further says that due to the amendments made to the NAB law last year, “some legal complications have arisen for transfer of those cases from the accountability courts to other courts, tribunals, and forums which do not fall within the domain or jurisdiction of the NAB Ordinance”.

Published in Dawn, May 15th, 2023