Justice Javed Iqbal, Chairman NAB has said that NAB had filed references against the big fish on charges of corruption, corrupt practices and money laundering on the basis of solid evidence which were laundered in the names of random ‘falooda wala’, ‘chhabri wala’ and ‘paupar wala etc.
The people who are claiming their innocence in the media should better request the concerned learned accountability courts to have hearings of their cases on a day to day basis so that they plead about their innocence where the law will take its own course of action. NAB would continue performing its national duties to bring the big fish to justice without caring about any baseless media reports and propaganda against NAB as an institution as per law.
He said that NAB is committed to the logical conclusion of white collar mega corruption cases by utilizing all available resources as per law. He said that NAB had constituted a Combined Investigation Team to benefit from the collective wisdom of senior supervisory officers. He said the CIT had the services of director, additional director, investigation officer, legal counsel and experts of the monetary and land revenue department which is lending quality. He said NAB was the focal institution of Pakistan under the UN Convention against corruption and the chairman of SAARC Anti-Corruption Forum.
He said NAB was considered a role model organization in SAARC countries. The Chairman said that NAB from Oct 2017 to Oct, 2021 has recovered Rs 538 billion directly and indirectly from corrupt elements which is a record achievement as compared to other years which shows a commitment and dedication of NAB officers towards performance of their national responsibilities in eradication of corruption from the country. He said that 1,264 corruption cases are under trial in various accountability courts of the country. Pakistan is the only country with whom China has signed a memorandum of understanding for the eradication of corruption. The performance of NAB is being reviewed regularly on the basis on a monitoring and evaluation system so that it could be improved further.
He said that the youth is our future; NAB has signed an MOU with the Higher Education Commission in order to create awareness amongst the youth about the ill effects of corruption in universities and colleges at an early age. Under this initiative, NAB has successfully established more than 50 thousand Character Building Societies in various universities and colleges besides constituting prevention committees in consultation with respective provincial and federal government departments in order to assist them to identify and plug loopholes to check corruption.
He said that as per a Gillani and Gallup survey, 59 percent people have shown trust in NAB. He said that NAB has devised a comprehensive Quantified Grading System in order to further improve the performance of NAB Headquarters and all Regional Bureaus.
Under a Quantified Grading System, NAB Headquarters and Regional Bureaus are being evaluated on an annual and midterm basis at a given criteria which has proved very successful in increasing the performance of NAB. The performance of NAB has been lauded by reputed national and international institutions.
