KARACHI: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has started inquiries and investigations against more than 600 persons, including 15 lawmakers, mostly sitting MPs belonging to the PPP, in Sindh.
This was revealed when a list was submitted to the larger bench of the Sindh High Court by NAB’s prosecutor-general during the hearing of identical petitions challenging Sindh government’s anti-corruption law that clipped NAB’s powers in the province.
Interestingly, deputy director of the provincial anti-corruption establishment, Dr Agha Aijaz Ali Pathan, is also facing graft inquiry under the NAB Ordinance 1999, which the ruling PPP is opposed to and has repealed.
The list showed three sitting legislators – two belonging to the MQM and one to the PML-N.
According to the list, PPP lawmakers facing graft allegations include Sindh Law and Prisons Minister Ziaul Hasan Lanja and Livestock, Fisheries and Environment Minister Muhammad Ali Malkani.
The other MPAs in the list include former information and local government minister Sharjeel Inam Memon, former minister excise, taxation and wildlife Gian Chand Israni, former Zakat and Ushr minister Dost Muhammad Rahimon, Dr Abdul Sattar Rajpar, Haji Abdul Rauf Khoso and Aijaz Ali Helepoto.
The former legislators include ex-petroleum advisor and former MNA Dr Asim Hussain and ex-MPAs Nasrullah Baloch, Ghulam Qadir Palijo and Agha Tariq.
The MQM’s sitting MPAs Abdul Rauf Siddiqui and M Adil Siddiqui also face corruption inquiries while PML-N’s Ejaz Shah Shirazi is also being probed.
Also on the list is former Karachi city Nazim, now leader of the Pak Sarzameen Party, Mustafa Kamal.
The list includes officers from almost all departments of the provincial government and agencies of the local governments.
Starting from the top, Sindh’s top bureaucrat Muhammad Siddique Memon to the watchman, Ghulam Mujataba, at the Dadu’s government school, appear on the list.
It showed that 712 inquiries and 782 investigations were pending against government officers. Trials in 982 cases – 572 in Karachi and 210 in Sukkur – were pending in the courts.
