ISLAMABAD: National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has so far received about 343,356 complaints from individuals, private and public organizations and recovered around Rs 287 billion from corrupt persons. The ill-gotten money was deposited in national exchequer, Chairman NAB, Qamar Zaman Chaudhry said this while chairing a monthly coordination meeting held here to review progress on previous decisions.
He said NAB has so far authorized 11,581 complaint verifications, 7587 inquiries, 3846 investigations, filed 2808 corruption references in respective accountability courts and overall conviction ratio is about 76 per cent. NAB’s prime focus is 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 figures of complaints, inquiries and investigations are almost double as compared to same period of 2015 to 2017. The comparative figures for last three years are indicative of hard work being put in by all ranks of NAB staff in an atmosphere of renewed energy and dynamism, where fight against corruption is being taken as a national duty.
Increase in number of complaints also reflects enhanced public trusted in the NAB. The PILDAT in its report supports the position stated above as 42 per cent people trusted NAB against 30 per cent for police and 29 per cent for government officials. The recent report of Transparency International also rated Pakistan in Corruption Perception Index (CPI) from 126 to 116. The World Economic Forum and Mishal Pakistan according to Global Competitiveness Index of World Economic Forum rated Pakistan from 126 to 122 this year.
He said to create awareness against ill effects of corruption among the youth, NAB in collaboration with Higher Education Commission (HEC) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and established over 45,000 Character Building Societies (CBSs) in universities/colleges. NAB has target that the number of CBSs should reach at-least at 50,000 in 2017.
He said NAB has devised Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to rationalize workload and timelines have 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 Accountability Court.
