PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Tuesday disposed of a petition against the directives of the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to the National Accountability Bureau for reopening cases of alleged irregularities in the Peshawar Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project, award of the Malam Jabba land lease, and appointments to the Bank of Khyber.

A bench consisting of Justice Syed Mohammad Attique Shah and Justice Wiqar Ahmad disposed of the plea after representatives of the NAB Khyber Pakhtunkhwa formally responded to it.

NAB deputy prosecutor general Azeem Dad and special DPG Mohammad Ali informed the bench that the case related to Malam Jabba land lease had not been re-opened as the matter was earlier decided by the high court.

They said the bureau’s investigation team had recorded a statement of one of the petitioners, Alamzeb Khan, a deputy director of the Peshawar Development Authority, in the BRT issue and he was not declared an accused in that matter and therefore, his grievance had already been addressed.

NAB says land lease case not reopened, while PDA official not named in transit bus case

About the alleged illegal appointments to BOK by the last PTI government in the province, they said following amendments to the NAB law, the matter was no longer in the bureau’s jurisdiction.

The bench observed that in the response of the NAB to those issues, there was no need to further proceed with the petition.

The petition was jointly filed by PDA deputy director Alamzeb Khan, who is a former director coordination of the BRT project, Bank of Khyber executive vice-president Sher Mohammad and former Tourism Corporation of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa managing director Mushtaq Khan.

The petitioners requested the court to declare illegal and without jurisdiction the directions of the PAC contained in the minutes of its July 7, 2022, meeting to the NAB chairman and its regional headquarters in Peshawar for re-investigating cases related to alleged irregularities in BRT, award of Malam Jabba land lease and BOK appointments.

They requested the court to strike down those directions and permanently restrain the NAB from acting on such directions issued by the PAC.

The PAC, in a meeting on July 7, 2022, directed the NAB acting chairman to reopen those cases and report to it within three months. It also directed the NAB to file a corruption reference about the Malam Jabba land lease within one month.

However, the high court issued a stay order in 2022 stopping the NAB from acting on those directives.

Advocate Qazi Jawad Ahsanullah contended that the mandate and jurisdiction of the PAC had been duly provided in the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business of the National Assembly, 2007 whereby the said committee had nothing to do with administration of criminal justice and offences related to corruption.

In the case of Malam Jabba land lease for a skiing resort, he stated that after a thorough and extended probe the NAB had come to the conclusion that no case of corruption and corrupt practices was made and so the matter was placed before NAB’s executive board for deliberation, which allowed closure of investigation on Nov 2, 2021.

Published in Dawn, January 24th, 2024