ISLAMABAD: Two senior officers of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) have been accused of blackmailing the management committee of a private housing society to get illegal benefits, a petition filed in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) claimed.

This is not the first time NAB officers have been accused of blackmailing and extortion. In the past too, officials of the bureau were accused of using their position to extort bribe from officials facing corruption charges.

In the latest case, the petition filed by the management committee of the private housing society alleged that a senior NAB officer and the investigating officer of the bureau used their office as “a tool of blackmailing and got a false reference filed against the management committee on its refusal to bow to their illegal demands.”

The petitioner alleged that in connivance with land grabbers the NAB officers had started interfering in the affairs of the society.

Officers froze society’s accounts after failing to get illegal benefits, petition alleges

The petition alleged that the two senior officers of NAB used their influence to sabotage the smooth functioning of the society and were working against the interest of its nearly 7,000 members.

Earlier in 2014, it added, land grabbers had filed false applications with the director Anti-Corruption Establishment Rawalpindi, the director general NAB Rawalpindi and the director general Federal Investigation Agency leveling allegations against the society.

On the basis of the allegations, an inquiry was conducted and the management committee was exonerated from all the allegations and subsequently the case was closed.

However, in 2015, the NAB officers again authorised an inquiry which was subsequently upgraded to an investigation on September 30, 2016. The petition said this was sufficient to prove the mala fide intention of the NAB officers as two months back the inquiry had been closed and the matter referred to the circle registrar. Subsequently, a reference was filed by NAB against the society in the accountability court.

The petition said the president of the management committee filed a complaint against the two officers with the NAB chairman.

The complainant also recorded his statement before NAB’s senior officials and the bureau transferred a director general from Rawalpindi, the petition said.

It claimed that in retaliation the NAB officers pressured the registrar office of the chief commissioner to refrain from notifying the elected members of the management committee but after failing to do so they took the charge of the society and froze its accounts on January 22, 2018, without any ground or reasoning.

The petitioner requested the court to direct the officials to de-freeze the society’s accounts.

After preliminary hearing, the IHC issued notices to the NAB chairman and other officers.

In 2016, Mohammad Ashraf, a patwari, had accused NAB officials of extortion. The then NAB chairman, Qamar Zaman Chaudhry, initiated disciplinary proceedings against the officials. But the inquiry was dropped after a year as a result of a ‘settlement’ between the complainant and the officials.

In this case, NAB had reopened an inquiry against the patwari which had been closed in 2009.

The bureau charged Mr Ashraf with “accumulation of assets beyond known sources of income.” However, in 2009, the charge was dropped against the patwari after the inquiry officers allegedly took bribe from him.

NAB officers in 2016 again summoned the patwari to probe the same allegations and allegedly demanded bribe from him.

While there are hundreds of complaints filed against NAB officers for allegedly blackmailing, misuse of authority and extortion, the bureau dismissed 22 officials for corruption and corrupt practices in about a decade.

Published in Dawn, February 27th, 2018