ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) on Thursday suggested constitution of a national task force (NTF) for investigating the alleged money laundering and tax evasion by prime minister’s family through offshore companies. The NTF, as per the proposal, shall be consisting of two eminent retired judges of the Supreme Court and a legal expert authorised by the chief justice of Pakistan. The SCBA suggested that the effective investigation can only be possible if the government seeks assistance from UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC), which deals with the investigation regarding allegations of corrupt assets concealed in offshore companies. Proposing the terms of references (TOR) for interrogating 200 Pakistanis named in Panama Papers, the SCBA suggested that the national task force may employ financial investigators, accountants, members of law enforcing agencies, legal or other experts and a well-known forensic institution. The TOR stated that the NTF shall have the power to constitute an international joint investigation team to seek international cooperation from foreign country’s agencies to provide information, documents, evidence and record from abroad by directing the government of Pakistan. The body of country’s top lawyers proposed that the time period for completion of the investigation shall be two months extendable to a maximum of six months from the date of commencement of the investigation. While the NTF shall cease to exist once it has finalised the investigation. The hearings of the national task force shall be open and transparent while it shall have the services of the FBR chairman, the deputy governor of SBP, director general of FIA and the NAB chairman at its disposal for the purposes of implementing any directions of the national taskforce. The task force may examine all relevant records including financial data, taxes, bank accounts, records of regulatory authorities, central or state banks, financial intelligence units, corporate records, and records of assets, lands, buildings, vehicles and any other evidence or take witness statement in Pakistan or outside Pakistan. The national task force shall be given the powers of a civil court in respect of matters of summoning, discovery and production of documents and issue of commissions. In addition, the national task force shall have the power to require persons to furnish information and to direct the law enforcement agencies to enter any building or place for the purposes of seizure of evidence. The national task force shall have powers to regulate its own procedure. The SCBA also noted that a domestic judicial or enquiry commission or parliamentary committee has no power to discover and collect relevant available evidence outside the boundaries of Pakistan nor has any jurisdiction over foreign countries’ agencies and entities or persons outside Pakistan.