ISLAMABAD: National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Qamar Zaman Chaudhry Saturday said corruption was the root cause of all evils and the NAB was committed to rooting out it at any cost.
Chairing a meeting here to review the latest working of all wings of the Bureau, he said the NAB during the period of present management of almost three years had initiated various initiatives, including establishment of three new regional offices at Multan, Sukkur and Gilgit Baltistan, according to a press release.
Qamar Zaman said the NAB had been rejuvenated in nabbing the corrupt, recovering the looted money and then depositing it in the national exchequer.
He said the NAB in the tenure of present management, not only chalked out a comprehensive and proactive strategy – National Anti-Corruption Strategy of Awareness, Prevention and Enforcement in order to root out corruption from the country and make all the public and private institutions to serve the general public on merit, having no complaint of `bribe or greed’ against them from the public.
The chairman said the NAB’s prime focus was on cases of cheating public at large by fraudulent financial companies, bank frauds, willful bank loan defaults, misuse of authority and embezzlement of state funds by government servants etc. He said through detailed introspection and analysis of organizational weaknesses, overhaul of procedures and business processes, all pillars of the organization i.e. Operations, Prosecution, Human Resource Development and Awareness and Prevention had been reactivated.
Qamar Zaman said the NAB’s operational methodology had been reviewed. It had rationalized its workload and timelines had been prescribed for efficient, effective and expeditious disposal of cases putting a maximum limit of 10 months from complaint verification-to-inquiry-to-investigation and finally to a reference in the accountability court.
The NAB, he said, had also introduced a new System of Combine Investigation Team (CIT) in order to benefit from the experience and collective wisdom of senior supervisory officers, a system of Combined
Investigation Team comprising of Director, Additional Director, Investigation Officer-and a Senior Legal Counsel had been put in place.
He said the NAB had established state of the Art Forensic Science LAB in Rawalpindi which had the facilities of Digital Forensics, Questioned Documents and Fingerprint Analysis. He said the NAB had undertaken a number of strategic initiatives aimed at its rejuvenation. The Organogram was revisited to transform NAB into an efficient and responsive organization, he added.
He said the NAB had devised a Containable Grading System (QGS) to monitor the performance of all its regions on annual basis. From 2015, under Quantifiable Grading System (QGS) NAB was monitoring the performance of all regional NAB’s and NAB headquarter on annual basis in order to know the strengths and weaknesses of NAB regional bureaus, he said.
He said the NAB had also introduced Internal Accountability Mechanism (IAM) System. Till todate out of 84 officers/officials, 23 officers had been imposed major penalty which is removal from service and 34 received minor penalties.
This was a record that any organization had initiated accountability process within its organization at its own, he added. He said the NAB has developed an effective Monitoring and Evaluation System (MES) catering the needs of all concerned having salient features of maintenance of data at each stage including complaint entry, complaint verification, inquiry, investigation, prosecution stage and record preservation of Regional Board Meetings and Executive Board Meetings including case brief, decisions made and list of participants attended the meeting with time 81 date and setting up of an effective Monitoring and Evaluation System and ability to analyze data in qualitative and quantitative form having warnings and alarms system for violators.
Qamar Zaman said that in order to identify loopholes, suggest ways and means to plug loopholes and measures for improvement/strengthening regulatory mechanism of Federal and Provincial Governments for transparency, meritocracy, fair play and compliance of relevant laws/rules, NAB has constituted prevention committees on Capital Development Authority (CDA), Ministry of
Religious Affairs, Agriculture and National Food security, National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination, Prevention Committee on FBR, Prevention Committee on PID and Prevention Committees constituted in Provinces relating to Health, Education, Revenue and Housing, Cooperatives etc. NAB’s Prevention Committee on Ministry or Religious Affairs has forwarded its recommendations to Ministry of Religious Affairs which were considered by Ministry of Religious
Affairs very aggressively in order tn provide better facilities to Hajis and to address problems of Hajis.
Due to this reason, arrangements made by Ministry of Religious Affairs during 2016 were appreciated by all Hajis. He emphasized NAB KP to constitute Prevention Committees in different departments in consultation with concerned departments so that NAB may know and suggest recommendations for further effective working of Provincial Departments.
