ISLAMABAD: Amid opposition's allegations of carrying out one-sided accountability, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), on Wednesday, transferred Malam Jabba skiing resort land lease case in which Defence Minister Pervaiz Khattak and Prime Minister's Principal Secretary were facing investigation to the provincial government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa for further action.
An official said that the decision to this effect was taken in the NAB Executive Board Meeting (EBM) presided over by Chairman NAB former Justice Javed Iqbal.
The EBM decided to refer Malam Jabba case in which former chief minister and defence minister Khattak and Prime Minister's Principal Secretary Azam Khan to the chief secretary Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
The anti-graft watchdog has been probing the Malam Jabba skiing resort land lease to a private party by the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government in 2014.
The then Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government had allegedly illegally leased 275 acres of land in Malam Jabba, a tourist resort in Swat district.
He said that the EBM was informed that in Malam Jabba case, on the writ petition of Samon Group, the Peshawar High Court (PHC) ordered for constitution of a committee, which was headed by additional chief secretary Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
The EBM committee pointed some irregularities in tendering process, he said
The official said that the EBM decided to refer irregularities to chief secretary Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa to have departmental action as per law after affording hearing opportunity to concerned officials with the condition that in case any restraining orders by the PHC, the case could be taken up after approval of the competent authority.
He said that the meeting also authorised filing of corruption and four corruption inquiries against former finance minister and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader and others.
The official said that meeting authorised filing of corruption reference against Syed Tajammul Hussain on the allegations of giving the advertisement of fake recruitments through illegal testing company, despite having no posts in the concerned departments on ground.
He looted the public at large and also received huge money from candidates on the pretext of fake advertisements for fake jobs just for the sake of minting money illegally.
He said that anti-graft body also approved conducting four inquiries against various personalities including Miftah Ismael, former finance minister and others, two inquiries against officers and officials of the National Highways Authority (NHA) and others, officers and officials of Irrigation and Revenue Department, Peshawar and others.
Hussain Asghar, Deputy Chairman NAB, Syed Asghar Haider, Prosecutor General Accountability (PGA), Director General Operations, and senior officers of the NAB also attended the meeting.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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