ISLAMABAD, Aug 2: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has initiated investigation against 15 district and tehsil nazims but they would not be barred from taking part in the forth coming elections, NAB’s spokesman Brigadier Nasir Mehmood told reporters in a press conference here on Tuesday.
The bureau, he said, had so far recovered Rs7.023billion under ‘plea of bargain’ provision and sent 806 cases before accountability courts. These included 172 cases against politicians, 440 against government servants, 13 against retired armed forces personnel and 106 against businessmen.
He said NAB was investigating cases against two former prime ministers, 10 chief ministers, 63 MNAs, nine senators and 92 MPAs.
Responding to a question about the cases in Swiss courts against former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and her husband Asif Ali Zardari, The NAB official said a Swiss Examining Magistrate, who enjoys status of a judge, had issued final notices the Ms Bhutto and her husband to appear before the court on September 19.
He said both of them were to appeared before him on July 13 but their counsel requested the court for adjournment saying Mr Zardari was not medically fit to travel and Ms Bhutto had to attend some important meeting in Dubai.
Brigadier Nasir said Ms Bhutto and her husband had been causing delay in finalisation of the cases by being intentionally absent on hearings of these cases.
He revealed that the bureau had initiated investigation against 15 district and tehsil nazims after receiving complaints of corruption against them. “We are investigating into the complaints and unless something is proved against them, they are free to contest any election”, he added.
He said if an accused was elected and was subsequently found guilty of the crime, he would be removed from his office brought to the book.
The spokesman was reluctant to give names of accused nazims to the media but said most of them, belonged to the Punjab. He claimed that rate of corruption had fallen in the country which had also been acknowledged by the Transparency International (TI). He said the TI chairman had appreciated the reforms agenda of the present government.
“We should be proud of what Dr Peter Eigen told the prime minister recently in a meeting”, he said. Last year, Pakistan was ranked 24 by the TI among the most corrupt countries.
He said the Punjab Cooperative Liquidation Board (PCLB) had, since 1992, paid a sum of Rs8.5billion to 219,125 people affected by the cooperative scam.
“Since 1999, when the NAB Ordinance was promulgated, we have recovered and paid 36,725 affected people a sum of Rs4.48 billion”, he added.
Replying to a question as to why NAB’s annual budget had increased as compared to the last year, he said its reason was that two wings of FIA, with a strength of 753 posts, had been merged into NAB.
“Our total strength of posts has risen by 63 percent. We had demanded a budget of Rs878 million while the National Assembly approved Rs752 million budget”, he added.