ISLAMABAD – National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Chairman Justice (retd)Javed Iqbal on Tuesday said NAB gave top priority to mega white collarcorruption cases as per law.The NAB chairman, in a statement, said the Bureau was committed to dealwith the corrupt with iron hands. “Corruption is the mother of all evils asit undermines economic development and deprives deserving persons of theirdue right as per law.”He said Pakistan was committed to the United Nations Convention againstCorruption (UNCAC) in eradicating corruption through its three-prongedAnti- Corruption Strategy of Awareness, Prevention and Enforcement.He said NAB since its inception had received about 399,861 complaints fromindividuals and private / public organizations. During the period, itauthorized 13,180 complaints verification, 8,587 inquiries and 4,124investigations, and filed 3,401 corruption references in respectiveaccountability courts.Currently, 1,230 corruption references were under trial in respectiveaccountability courts across the country and their approximately worth wasof Rs 901 billion.He said the figures of complaints, inquiries and investigations were almostdouble as compared to the same period of 2018 to 2019. The comparativefigures for the latest 18 months were indicative of the hard work being putin by all ranks of NAB staff in an atmosphere of renewed energy anddynamism, where fight against corruption was being taken as a nationalduty. Increase in the number of complaints also reflected enhanced publictrust in NAB, he added.The chairman said NAB’s prime focus was on cases of cheating public atlarge by fraudulent financial companies, money laundering, bank frauds,willful bank loan defaults, misuse of authority and embezzlement of statefunds by government servants etc.Since its inception, he said one of NAB’s major achievements had been therecovery of around Rs 303 billion of ill-gotten money, which was depositedin the national exchequer.He said NAB had perfected its procedures. With reinvigorated zeal andefforts after through detailed introspection and analysis of organizationalweaknesses, overhaul of procedures and all pillars of the organization i.e.Operations, Prosecution, Human Resource Development and Awareness andPrevention had been reactivated.He said NAB had established its first Forensic Science Lab (FSL) in NABRawalpindi which had facilities of Digital Forensics, Questioned Documentsand Fingerprint Analysis.As per the report of Transparency International (TI), he said Pakistan’sranking in the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) had improved. It was beingconsidered a role model in South Asian countries due its its effortsagainst corruption. It was a great achievement for Pakistan.The Corruption Perception Index (CPI) in the Pakistan as per TransparencyInternational (TI) report, he said, was declining consistently due to stepstaken by the present management of NAB against the corrupt. The otherindependent national and international watchdogs like PLIDAT and WorldEconomic Forum had also appreciated Pakistan’s efforts to curb corruptionin Pakistan. Similarly, Gilani and Gallop in a survey conducted in October2018 had indicated that 59 percent people of Pakistan had full faith in NABwhich was an ample evidence of NAB’s across the board accountability, headded.
Rs 901 billion corruption reference under trial in Pakistan: NAB
