Irked by absence of NAB chief, PAC accuses accountability czar of ‘facilitating’ corrupt

Public Accounts Committee (PAC) chairman on Tuesday accused the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) of “facilitating” corrupt people instead of going after them, saying NAB’S performance was “zero” as PAC has made more recoveries than the anti-graft body during his tenure. Irked by the absence of NAB chairman Lt Gen (retd) Nazir Ahmad Butt, PAC chairman Noor Alam Khan directed to fix a PAC meeting next week with directions to the NAB chairman to appear before the accountability arm of the parliament.

When the NAB officials told the PAC chairman that Butt couldn’t appear before the committee as his scheduled flight had been cancelled, Alam said that he would dig out the claim if the NAB chairman was in Islamabad or somewhere else, saying “I have more powers than NAB.” Following PAC meeting, Alam while answering a question, said that finding out about flight cancellation, among other things, was not difficult. He reiterated that everyone is answerable to the PAC.

Lashing out at the NAB chairman, Alam said that Butt takes roughly Rs1.8 million as salary but the recoveries are not up to the mark and dozens of cases referred to NAB by PAC were still pending for months. “I’m not satisfied with NAB’S performance,” Alam said, reiterating that they take hefty salaries but “performance is zero”. Alam made it clear that he won’t take briefing from the NAB officials, including NAB’S deputy chairman, saying the Principal Accounting Officer (PAO), the NAB chairman, should appear before the PAC to explain things next week. “Instead of going after corrupt people,” Noor said, “NAB is facilitating them.” At one point, Alam said that he doesn’t fear anyone and won’t take briefings from anyone other than the PAO even if people are not happy with him, approach him, or ask others to make calls to take briefing.

The remarks came after PML-N’S Birjees Tahir asked why he was taking a lenient view when NAB chairman being PAO was absent.