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Discretionary powers are root-cause of corruption: NAB chief

RECORDER REPORT

KARACHI: Lt. General Syed Mohammad Amjad, Chairman, National Accountability Bureau (NAB), has said that the root-cause of corruption was the vast discretionary powers given to the officials, even at very low level.

Addressing members of the business community at the Federation House have on Monday afternoon, he said that its assessment was based on the study of cases so far handled by him. Capacity-based taxation system would take away the discretionary powers of taxation officials, he added.

Amjad said that the main job of his organisation concerns corruption and only 5 percent work is related to bank loan defaults.

He said that if the businessmen and the bankers were scared of NAB it was their own fault. During the past three and a half months NAB has not taken any action to aggravate the situation and no arrests have been made after November 17.

He said that NAB had taken action in respect of bank default cases of principal amount of Rs 100 million or more but it had been ensured that no running industry was closed down.

The General said that the list of directors of bank loan defaulting companies was provided by the State Bank of Pakistan, and not by his organisation, for inclusion in the Exit Control List. The list is being reviewed to exclude family members and non-active directors, he said and added that it was a time consuming work.

He said that it was an oversight that FPCCI representative was not included in the Reconciliation Committee constituted under the Accountability Ordinance, and promised to talk to the finance minister about it.

He denied that NAB had ordered the freezing of bank accounts of anybody, even of those under NAB custody.

In reply to a suggestion he said that it was the decision of Supreme Court that pressure from the top could not be taken as an excuse for wrong actions.

Earlier, FPCCI President Fazal-ur-Rehman Dittu, said that his organisation had supported across the board accountability announced by the Chief Executive and had called for putting in place a transparent system of accountability directed against wilful defaulters. He said that as a result of the drive, government recoveries had been commendable, but the psychological impact on overall industry, business and banking had been very bad. Investment had been scared away and confidence of local business had been shaken.

He said that no banker is willing to entertain legitimate requests for restructuring and rescheduling of bona fide loans for fear of accountability, and added that they need assurance from the highest in authority that they would not be punished for their honest judgements.

He said that the businessmen should be left to do business and NAB should concentrate on correcting the corrupt system.