ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court is likely to take up on July 23 an application accusing the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) of misleading the court by presenting an evasive list of 150 mega scandals.

The application, filed by Dr M. Shafiq-ur-Rahman, alleged that the list submitted to the court was not based on facts.

A two-judge bench, headed by Justice Jawwad S. Khawaja, indicated that it would issue notices to NAB after going through the application during Eid vacations.

On July 13, NAB had submitted an amended list of 150 mega scandals — 50 cases each of financial scam, land scam and abuse of power. Of them, 71 cases in three categories are in the inquiry stage and 41 in investigation, while 38 references have been filed and are pending in different accountability courts.

The list contained the names of top politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen, including Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, former prime ministers Raja Pervez Ashraf, Yousuf Raza Gilani and Chaudhry Shujaat Ahmed and Finance Minister Ishaq Dar.

In his application, a copy of which has also been submitted to NAB Chairman Qamar Zaman Chaudhry, Dr Shafiq alleged that the bureau officials had apparently concealed the names of “real offenders” to save them from accountability. “Such kind of screening is always mala fide and can conveniently be considered obstruction in the process of justice,” he said.

The petitioner said the list’s serial No 33 on page 24 had mentioned an investigation against Messers Businessman Mutual Housing Society whereby an amount of Rs15 million was stated as the worth of the land scam. By any stretch of imagination such amount cannot be included in the list of mega land scams as has been done by NAB.

Similarly, he said, in the list of financial scams there were eight cases of under Rs200m. While there are altogether a total of 33 cases involving alleged embezzlement of less than Rs1 billion in the list, in three cases the embezzled amount has yet to be determined.

In short, the application said, of the 50 cases of financial scam, 36 are minor, unclear or doubtful. This kind of misleading list only tarnishes the image of NAB even more in the eyes of public at large.

Likewise in the list of land scams, the petitioner said, there are eight cases wherein the alleged amount in jeopardy had been evaluated at Rs100m or below. The size of the land scam is below Rs1bn in 32 cases.

“It is quite apparent that the major land scams were deliberately not included by NAB in its list, apparently to mislead the court and accommodate the actual culprits,” the petitioner said, adding that this “deliberate omission” showed the guilt of the NAB officials concerned.

In the list of abuse of official position by public office-holders involving Rs100m or below, there are eight cases, with lowest amount stated to be Rs3.1m.

Inclusion of these negligible amounts in the list further dented the already diminished credibility of NAB, the petitioner said, adding that such amounts did not fit the criteria of mega scams, thus providing undeserved benefit to the real culprits who had embezzled billions of rupees through corruption and corrupt practices.

The petitioner argued that such concealment of material facts from the court of law amounted to contempt of the court under Article 204 of the Constitution.

Published in Dawn, July 18th, 2015

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