NAB approved 440 corruption references in a year: chairman

Author: Agencies

National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Chairman Justice (r) Javed Iqbal Sunday said the anti-graft watchdog has approved 440 corruption references in a year.

He said NAB received 44,315 complaints in a year. After going through all the complaints, the institution began probe into 1,703 cases. “877 inquiries were held during last 12 months, while Rs 2,600 million were recovered in 227 different investigations,” he said in a statement. As many as 503 suspects were arrested in different cases, he said.

The NAB chief stated that investigations into misappropriation of funds, plundering of national wealth, misuse of authority, mega corruption cases, money laundering, cases of cheating public, assets beyond known sources of income, housing societies/cooperative societies, bank frauds and willful bank loan defaults were the top priorities. He reiterated that the bureau was working on ‘zero tolerance’ policy against corruption. He said NAB is absolutely committed to nab corrupt elements and recover looted money from them by using all resources across the board and with iron hand as per law.

An amount of Rs 2.6 billion recovered in 227 different investigations in last 12 months

He directed all DGs of NAB to proceed against proclaimed offenders and absconders so that they should be brought to justice as per law. He said that corruption is mother of all evils. “Eradication of corruption is not only our national duty but is top most priority of NAB. NAB officers must double their efforts to eradicate corruption by adopting ‘Accountability for All’ policy to root out corruption from the country with iron hand,” he said. Since inception, NAB’s major achievement is recovery of Rs 297 billion of ill-gotten money from corrupt elements which was deposited in the national exchequer, he added.

He said that NAB has established its first state-of-the-art forensic science laboratory in NAB Rawalpindi which has facilities of digital forensics, questioned documents and fingerprint analysis. He said NAB has introduced combine investigation team system in order to benefit from the collective wisdom of senior officers. “This is not only lending quality to the work but also ensuring that no single individual can influence the official proceedings of NAB. A system has been put in place to monitor the performance of NAB officers on regular basis as NAB strongly believes in self-accountability,” he added.

Published in Daily Times, January 21st 2019.

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