Daily Times

National Accountability Bureau on Tuesday was granted another 14-day extension in the physical remand of Punjab’s former chief minister Shehbaz Sharif in Ashiana Housing scandal as the previous 10-day remand expired. Shehbaz Sharif told the court that he wasn’t interrogated at all for the first three days and then personally requested the NAB investigators to start the probe.

If true, this is certainly indicative of the lack of seriousness on part of the anti graft body in actually investigating into the case. In fact it strengthens the view held by the main opposition party, Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PMLN), that the case against its party president is politically motivated and the only objective is to malign him.

Shehbaz Sharif is the Opposition Leader in National Assembly and heads the biggest opposition party in the country. The manner in which he was arrested, without informing the Speaker of National Assembly, was in itself in violation of the established norms and rules.

The inquiry into Ashiana Housing scam was opened in February of this year when former LDA DG Ahad Cheema was arrested. It’s been nine months since Cheema is under NAB’s custody. Former Secretary to Chief Minister Punjab Fawad Hasan Fawad was also arrested on July 6. But during all these months, NAB hasn’t been able to produce any concrete evidence before the court.

In the meantime, TV channels have repeatedly aired reports from ‘credible sources within NAB’ that Ahad Cheema and Fawad Hasan Fawad had decided to become approvers in the case. While it won’t be the first time in Pakistan’s political history that a civil servant turns an approver against a politician, even that may not have happened as yet.

Add to this the recent meetings between NAB Chairman with Prime Minister Imran Khan, who himself faces a NAB case, and later with Federal Minister for Maritime Affairs, the impression of an impartial NAB is dwindling by the day. If anything, the PML-N’s claims of victimization have been gaining ground which is not good for the accountability drive PM Khan has promised.

It goes without saying that corruption in this country is rampant and that NAB must do its duty to curb it. There is no shortcut to due process and impartial prosecution. Trading allegations in political rallies and vicious media trials do not constitute ‘accountability’ but they only weaken the rule of law in the country.  *

Published in Daily Times, October 17^th 2018.