Pakistan Peoples Party's Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari demanded on Monday that chairman National Accountability Bureau (NAB) should appear before the Parliament to brief it about the ongoing corruption cases. Speaking on the floor of National Assembly, he said time has come for the Parliament to call the NAB chairman and enact a law that if there is a case against any parliamentarian, it should first be referred to a house committee before sending it to the anti-corruption watchdog.
"The NAB chairman should appear in person before the Parliament," he said, adding that he and his family are facing a joint investigation team over fictitious bank accounts. "I am thankful to the Chief Justice for removing the name of Bilawal from the JIT report," he said. The former president said that he has faced "such jokes" before and would be facing them in future too. He also termed the JIT report "uncalled for and above the law."
He said it is in the government's interest to rein in the NAB as doing so will reduce the prevailing insecurity in the bureaucracy and the country will start functioning to some extent. Criticising the PTI government's performance, he said, "We will not bring down your government, you will fall yourselves."
Speaking about financial support the PTI government has received from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), he said the international financial support being given to Pakistan by friendly countries is welcome, but no foreign force can prevent the economic slide the country appeared to be heading towards because of the PTI government's policies.
"Considering the financial situation at present and the way decisions are being taken arbitrarily... the country cannot be managed in this manner," he said.
Earlier speaking on a point of order, Leader of Opposition in the National Assembly Shahbaz Sharif criticised the consideration of a single bid by the PTI government for the Mohmand Dam project.
He said the decision reflects conflict of interest, where the other parties were not given equal opportunities. He demanded the government take up the issue on the floor of the assembly and refer it to the House Committee. "Awarding the contract over a single bid is a big question mark," he said, adding that the government should have gone for rebidding over the Rs 309 billion project.
"The government has violated the PPRA rules," he said, adding, "Above all it is also a question of direct conflict of interest." Before a treasury member could respond to the points raised by the opposition leader and PPP co-chairman, the opposition parties staged a walkout from the House.
Minister for Water Resources Faisal Vawda rebuffed allegations of Shahbaz Sharif about bidding of the Mohmand Dam, saying, "The project that is advertised does not come under the banner of single bidding." He labelled the opposition's questions over the construction of dam as a conspiracy against the water reservoir. "No dam has been built in the country for the last 54 years, but we will complete this project at all costs," he added.
The minister informed the House that 28 companies bought the bidding documents, out of which five took part in the bidding process. He said in November 2017, the tenders for the project were called and documents were submitted in June last year.
He said at that time there was no PTI government. Vawda said PTI government and its functionaries had no role in the whole process. He said his government has already taken a discount of Rs 7 billion on the construction costs from the bidder.
Minister for Communications and Postal Services Murad Saeed said that both PML-N and PPP are playing a kayfabe to protect their ill-gotten wealth; and they now stand exposed before the nation.
Minister for Power Omar Ayub informed the House that the previous PML-N government installed the costly RLNG power projects by ignoring the cheap renewable energy projects.
He said the PTI government is working on improvement of the transmission system and is reducing line losses by using modern technology.
During the Question Hour, Minister for Religious Affairs Noor ul Haq Qadri informed the House that Pakistan Madressah Board could not become functional because Wafaqs and Tanzeemat did not nominate their representatives on the board and refused to adopt the government initiative.
Responding to another question, he said the Saudi government has imposed 2000 riyals as fee on pilgrims who offer Umra for the second or multiple times. This fee has been levied on repeated Umra performers of all nationalities, he added.
The minister said that he has taken up the issue of extra fee with Saudi authorities and is expecting a positive response from them on it. The House also passed a resolution with consensus condemning in strongest words the murder of former lawmaker Faisal Raza Abidi in Karachi. The resolution urged the government to make sure that lives and properties of people are protected.