pakistan’s National Accountability Bureau official removed
By IANSWednesday, March 31, 2010
ISLAMABAD - The Pakistani government Wednesday sacked a senior official of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), as also an aide of the country’s interior minister, in line with a Supreme Court directive.
The court had last December nullified the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO), an amnesty against graft, and asked the government to remove NAB Prosecutor General Danishwar Malik and Sajjad Haider, the staff officer of Interior Minister Rehman Malik.
Danishwar Malik had taken into his possession the court records relating to a Swiss money laundering case involving President Asif Ali Zardari when Pakistan asked for this to be closed citing the NRO, Online news agency reported.
On Wednesday, the NAB told the Supreme Court that the Swiss authorities have been approached to reopen this case.
Then president Pervez Musharraf promulgated the NRO primarily to enable former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and her husband Zardari, who faced a slew of corruption cases, to return home from self-imposed exile.
Bhutto was assassinated in a gun and bomb attack as she left a political rally in the adjacent garrison town of Rawalpindi December 27, 2007.
A host of other politicians, retired army officers and bureaucrats also benefited from the NRO. With the amnesty now being annulled, cases against 158 individuals who had benefited from it have now been reopened.
Haider is considered a close friend of Interior Minister Malik, also a beneficiary of the NRO, besides being accused in another graft case which has now been reopened.
Meanwhile, the names of Danishwar Malik and Sajjad Haider have been included in the exit control list, which means they cannot leave the country without the government’s specific permission.
April 1, 2010: 4:43 pm
Supreme Court under Iftikhar Chaudhry is utterly dishonest, highly incompetent, intellectually corrupt, politically motivated and totally biased. Reasons for this are detailed below:- PPP government and its legal team lack co-ordination and depth. Their comprehension is slow and response to the illegalities of Supreme Court is either lacking or apologetic. The Attorney General is not performing his constitutional role of telling the Supreme Court that Judiciary is exceeding its constitutional limits. The Attorney General is either silent in this matter for fear of contempt or is unaware of his constitutional obligations as Attorney General. The hitherto performance of Attorney General shows lack of competence and commitment. Senator Faisal Raza Abidi is a fairly competent person but he is alone. He needs a team of accomplished legal experts to support and supplement him. It appears that PPP’s legal advisers are hindering the formation of a larger team of legal experts in order to keep their monopoly. This monopoly is seriously undermining the writ of the government especially when it is facing strong opposition from PML [N] who have very close links with Supreme Court Judges. Some of these connections are detailed below:- Conclusion These facts are absolutely correct and can be verified by anyone. |
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