The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) has accused the present regime of covering up its role in buying oil from three companies during the military government that had made payment of surcharge in the United Nations Oil for Food programme.
According to a statement issued by the party here on Sunday the documentary evidences revealed that under the Musharraf government, three companies bought oil from Iraq under the oil for food programme worth nearly dollars 500 million paying cumulatively over dollars 400 million in surcharge to the Saddam regime.
The PPP says that that oil was sold to Pakistan and alleged offences were in the legal jurisdiction of Pakistan, which come under the purview of Pakistani law.
The party was of the view that three contracting companies involved in the business are M/s A&A Services, M/s BC International (Pvt) Limited and M/s Oil and Gas Services Group.
The PPP regretted the NAB had not moved against them.
Benazir Bhutto stated that she was unaware of such payments being made and rejected the charges that she had been involved in such payments.
In the statement, the Vice President of the Party, Makhdoom Amin Fahim has questioned why the Musharraf regime had tried to cover up the alleged offences of surcharge payment made by companies doing business with Pakistan. He demanded to know their association with the regime, which was barring the NAB from taking action against them.
He said the PPP had called for a parliamentary probe into the said companies to identify their association with the regime as well as challenged the NAB to move against them if they indeed believed that surcharge was a bribe and paid in the oil for food programme.
The three companies selling oil to Pakistan paid this surcharge too.
Makhdoom Amin Fahim said the NAB had failed to fulfil its function of investigating corruption as it was involved in political persecution.
He further alleged the regime had failed to investigate the sugar price scam and other corruption allegations filed by the PPP before the NAB.
The PPP leader said according to documents available with the PPP, the following amounts of oil were lifted by and surcharge paid: i) The A&A Services lifted 100,000 barrels of oil for dollars 14 million for which it paid dollars 240,000 in surcharge. ii) The B C International lifted over eight million barrels of oil for dollars 174 million after paying a surcharge of over 1.4 million dollars. iii) The Oil and Gas Services Group lifted over 14 million barrels of oil valuing over dollars 300 million after paying 2.6 million dollars in commissions.
He was of the view the surcharge amounts were deposited in the Jordan National Bank between March 2001 and October 2002.
Another deposit was also made in Fransa Bank. The PPP said the regime through the NAB was wasting national funds by chasing a Gulf based company established after the fall of the PPP government for the alleged payment of surcharge where there was no misuse of official authority involved.