Majority of amendments to NAB ordinance withdrawn
islamabad — The ordinance promulgated on November 1, that curtailed the powers of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), has been severely criticised by the opposition parties and others.
In view of the growing criticism against the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government’s move, described by many as “mother of all NROs” to businessmen, politicians and bureaucrats, a second ordinance was promulgated by President Arif Alvi on Saturday withdrawing majority of changes in the ordinance, Dawn reported.
Two major opposition parties — the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and the Pakistan Peoples Party — had rejected the ordinance, alleging that the government was bent on protecting a few of its “cronies” and “dry-clean” the PTI.
The law ministry on Saturday officially released the text of the controversial ordinance — The National Accountability (Second Amendment) Ordinance, 2019 — that still favours the country’s businessmen who will no longer attract the NAB’s action against them. The cases pertaining to “federal or provincial taxation, levies or imposts” have been excluded from the ambit of the accountability law and the existing “trials shall stand transferred from the relevant Accountability Courts to the criminal courts” dealing with such offences.
The first amendment in the NAB Ordinance 1999 was made by the government on November 1 which deprived the people involved “in any offence involving any amount above Rs50 million” from availing better classes in the prison.
The ordinance not only took care of the business community, but to some extent, also favoured politicians and bureaucrats as it redefined the terms “misuse of authority” and “acts done in good faith”, according to the Dawn.
Surprisingly, the text of the amendment does not contain several clauses, reported by the media on Friday, quoting from the text that had unofficially been provided to media personnel by the official quarters, including the NAB.
The law ministry has released a “Revised Updated NAB Ordinance”, thus causing further confusion.
In text messages sent to the media persons, the law ministry spokesperson said: “This is the one approved by the president. It will be notified later.
“The moment, (the) President signed the Ordinance it was promulgated. Now it is being published in the Gazette. The printing is going to be the official notification.
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Ordinance will most probably be notified on Monday or Tuesday in the official Gazette,” said the spokesperson in another text message, without mentioning as to when the president approved it.
The ordinance that was issued to the media on Saturday did not carry any restrictions on the NAB as announced on Friday from taking up cases involving corruption or corrupt practices below an amount of Rs500 million as well as from issuing public statements at the stage of inquiry or investigation of a complaint.
The new ordinance neither specifies any time period for completing a probe nor bars the NAB from reopening any inquiry or investigation.