Islamabad: The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has raised a question mark over the recommendations made by Accountant General Pakistan Revenue (AGPR) to settle excess expenditure of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) which is unauthorised in nature and amounts to Rs387 million.
It asked accountability watchdog to get extra expenses approved from the National Assembly as mandate in this connection rest with the parliament and PAC got no power to settle it.
The PAC meeting was held in the committee room No 2 of Parliament House on Tuesday which was chaired by MNA Tanveer Hussain.
The appearance of NAB Chairman Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal before PAC was the major highlight of the committee’s proceedings. Previously PAC had been repeatedly demanding from chairman NAB to appear before the superior panel of the Parliament but these directives were not met accordingly.
However, chairman NAB first time appeared before the PAC and faced some grilling questions from the members of the committee.
The Departmental Account Committee (DAC) of NAB has recommended for settlement of excess financial grant for NAB by PAC but it refused to honour the recommendation and asked for approval of it through the parliament when the mini-budget was tabled.
During the proceedings the chairman of the panel asked the official of AGPR as how the audit authority can ask for settlement of matter by the PAC which is illegal as the Finance Division refused to honour the request of NAB for supplementary grant for it. The chair was of the view that the audit authorities never give luxury like it to other government departments.
The chair was of the view that earlier NAB spent the excess grant and then it approached the relevant authorities to regularize it. It said that this amount would be recovered from NAB if through proper channel for its settlement is not adopted.
The DAC of NAB held its meeting on December 1, 2021. According to brief on appropriation of AGPR, the department explained that excess was mainly due to imposition of curtailment orders of the government by 10 per cent and following this order the department surrendered an amount of Rs118 million.
Moreover, the federal government sanctioned certain allowance in favour of regular employees of NAB during the financial year. To meet the budgetary deficit a case was initiated with the Finance Division for allocation of a supplementary grant.
However, despite repeated requests the finance division did not support the request of supplementary grant during the year 2018-19 to cover the excess expenditure.
Chairman NAB was of the view that this excess expenditure was spent on essential items like increase in the salaries of NAB employees.
Earlier on the arrival of the NAB chairman in the standing committee the chair said that its beyond his understanding as why the head of bureau was reluctant to appear before the panel.
“It would certainly enhance your respect if you appear before the parliament as it is the right forum to get it informed about certain inquires. Generally, we learn about your performance through newspapers. You being the justice yourself know well about rules and regulations. I have seen your papers and they are reflecting that everything is quite clean. I have not seen audit paras for settlement which is unprecedented in nature,” the chairman PAC, Tanveer Hussain observed.
To it the NAB chairman stated that there is no ambiguity that the parliament is the supreme institution. He said he had some reasons when he could not appear before the panel.
“I am not a Mughal emperor and am always ready for accountability,” the head of the bureau maintained.
Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal said that during his four-year term as the chairman he has been conducting the NAB audit of on a regular basis. He said the audit of his department is complete.
While briefing the panel on details of recoveries made by NAB he said the recoveries are not in shape of currency notes but in shape of other assets. He said NAB has been handing over the recovered assets to the respective provincial governments and other entities.
The panel after consultation with members asked the chairman NAB to give in-camera detailed briefing during first week of January next year about its recoveries which is stated to be Rs821 billion.
