ISLAMABAD: National Accountability Bureau (NAB) chairman retired Justice Javed Iqbal on Friday reviewed the performance of the operation wing of the anti-graft watchdog and said the bureau had recovered Rs71 billion over the last 22 months.

“Comparative figures of the last 22 months are also indicative of NAB’s excellent performance as the bureau has recovered and deposited Rs71 billion in the national exchequer which is a record achievement,” the NAB chairman said while presiding over a meeting.

A NAB spokesman quoted the NAB chairman as saying that the bureau was committed to eradicating corruption by adopting “Accountability for All” policy with iron hands.

Calls for an effective national anti-corruption strategy

The chairman said that NAB wanted to uproot corruption through an effective national anti-corruption strategy and it was focusing mainly on white-collar crimes.

He said that figures of complaints, inquiries and investigations recorded this year almost doubled as compared to those of the last year.

NAB, he said, had also filed 600 corruption cases in respective accountability courts over the last 22 months, which were under trial.

“Reputed national and international organisations such as Transparency International, World Economic Forum, Pildat and Mishal Pakistan have appreciated NAB’s efforts to eradicate corruption from society. According to Gillani Research Foundation and Gallup Survey, 59 per cent of people have shown confidence in NAB,” he added.

Justice Iqbal said that NAB had introduced a new concept of combined investigation team (CIT) to benefit from the experience and collective wisdom of senior supervisory officers. The CIT is consisted of a director, an additional director, an investigation officer and a senior legal counsel.

“This is not only lending quality to work but also ensuring that no single individual influences official proceedings of NAB,” he added.

The NAB chief said that the bureau had established a state-of-the-art forensic laboratory in its Rawalpindi office, which had facilities of digital forensics, documents and fingerprint analysis and these facilities were further improving quality of inquiry and investigation in all respect.

He said that due to prescribed timeline of 10 months for efficient, effective and expeditious disposal of cases from complaint verification to inquiry-to-investigation and finally to a reference in an accountability court, NAB had devised a comprehensive quantified grading system to further improve the performance of NAB headquarters and all regional bureaus.

“Under the quantified grading system, NAB headquarters and regional bureaus are being evaluated on mid-term and annual basis at given criteria, which has proved very successful and the performance of NAB regional bureaus was getting increased day by day due to regular monitoring and inspections,” he said

Justice Iqbal said that NAB had signed an MoU with China to oversee China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects being executed in the country.

He said that as the youth were future of the country, NAB had signed an MoU with Higher Education Commission to make them aware of ill-effects of corruption at an early age.

“More than 50,000 character-building societies have been established in colleges and universities of the country,” he added.

The NAB chief directed all officials of the anti-graft watchdog to conduct complaint verifications, inquiries and investigations within the prescribed time so that all mega-corruption cases could be brought to their logical conclusion as per law.

Published in Dawn, September 21st, 2019