Top officials of NAB: Senate to discuss Mandviwalla's privilege motion today

ISLAMABAD: The Upper House of the Parliament is scheduled to meet on Wednesday (today) to discuss privilege motion moved by Deputy Chairman Senate Saleem Mandviwalla against top officials of National Accountability Bureau (NAB), and six other agenda items that are highly critical of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government.

Requisitioned by 34 opposition senators, today's session under Chairman Senate Sadiq Sanjrani will discuss seven-point agenda. The agenda items included discussions on "egregious human rights violations and media trials committed by National Accountability Bureau in its victimization of targeted opposition workers, government's unprecedented crackdown on opposition workers, alarming propensity of the federal government to usurp and subvert parliamentary and provincial rights guaranteed in the Constitution by attempting to rule the country by ordinances, unprecedented gas and energy crisis in the entire country, unabated price increases, crippling inflation and the rising graph of food insecurity, pre-poll rigging and election tampering at all stages by government in the recent Gilgit-Baltistan elections, precipitous economic situation and growing volume of loans taken by the PTI government."

The opposition is also set to pass a resolution in the requisitioned session against NAB and its top officials and it would also push for referring the matter of NAB's "egregious human rights violations" to Senate's Functional Committee on Human Rights, a Pakistan People's Party (PPP) senator told Business Recorder, requesting anonymity. The said committee is headed by PPP Senator Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar.

It merits mentioning here that the deputy chairman Senate has moved a privilege motion against Chairman NAB former Justice Javed Iqbal, Director General NAB Rawalpindi Irfan Mangi and Investigation Officer Mudassar Naqvi who probed Mandviwalla case in NAB.

In recent days, Mandviwalla has held hard-hitting pressers against NAB and its top officials wherein he has accused the national accountability watchdog of human rights violations including custodial deaths and other heinous crimes. Mandviwalla also announced few days back that "production warrants" of chairman NAB would be issued if he failed to show up at the Senate session.

However, a senator, on strict condition of anonymity said the Senate has no powers to issue arrest warrants of any individual as there is no provision in the law that empowers Senate to issue warrants. The chairman Senate, speakers of National Assembly and provincial Assemblies as well as chairpersons of relevant committees are empowered only to issue production orders of those lawmakers that are in custody of relevant authorities, the source said.

Last week, Mandviwalla had denied that there was any plan to arrest chairman NAB.

The source said privilege motion against Mandviwalla can be debated in the House in detail in the requisitioned session and it can be referred to the relevant standing committee but there is not much the House can do about NAB without parliamentary legislation.

"Senate can pass a resolution against chairman NAB suggesting his removal from office or initiating action against him and such a resolution can also be passed by the relevant standing committee but these resolutions are not binding on government or anyone," the senator said.

"A resolution related to Executive (government) simply reflects the sense of the House. It is up to the government whether or not it honours the resolution. Moreover, neither government nor Parliament has any administrative jurisdiction on NAB as it is completely an independent constitutional entity," the lawmaker said.

"It is unlikely that opposition would try to resort to legislation to curtail NAB's powers as chances of the passage of any such bill from Parliament are very small,: he added.

The senator referred to the Rule 134 (1) of the Rules of Procedures and Conduct of Business in the Senate 2012, which clearly links a resolution with an opinion, recommendation, urge or a request. "A resolution may be in the form of a declaration of opinion, or a recommendation, or convey a message, or commend, urge or request an action, or call attention to a matter or situation for consideration by the government, or in such other form as the chairman may consider appropriate," this rule reads.

Unlike president of Pakistan who can be impeached by the Parliament by two-third majority, chairman NAB cannot be removed from office through impeachment by Parliament. Section 6 (b) (i) of NAB Ordinance 1999 clearly provides that chairman NAB "shall not be removed except on the grounds of removal of a judge of the Supreme Court of Pakistan."

The judges of the apex court can be removed through the proceedings of Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) in accordance with Article 209 of the Constitution of Pakistan if found guilty of any kind of misconduct.

Apart from that, Federal Information Minister Shibli Faraz has already announced that treasury benches would oppose Mandviwalla's privilege motion against NAB's top officials in the Senate session.

NAB had informed an accountability court last month that it had frozen 3.1 million shares of different companies registered in the name of Mandviwalla with the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) in connection with the fake accounts case pending against him.

Recently, NAB submitted a report to the accountability court of Islamabad, reaffirming allegations against Mandviwalla in connection with the fake bank accounts case.

Half of total members of Senate or 52 senators including the incumbent deputy chairman Senate would retire in the coming March after completing their six-year term at the Upper House of the Parliament.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020