NA committee summons NAB chief on May 22 after excuse from appearance today
NA body had summoned NAB chief over inquiry against former premier, others for allegedly laundering $4.9 billion to India
May 16, 2018
ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly's Standing Committee for Law and Justice directed National Accountability Bureau (NAB) chairperson Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal to appear before it on May 22 after he asked to be excused from appearing today.
The NAB chief had been summoned to appear before the committee over the money laundering probe against former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
The NAB chief had been directed to give a briefing on the probe into allegations of money laundering against the deposed prime minister.
Justice (retd) Iqbal shared that he received the notice for the appearance in the morning, adding that he has meetings planned for the day and requested the committee to set an appropriate time for his appearance.
The committee, which had called NAB chief after taking notice of a point of order raised by PML-N assembly member Rana Hayat, refused to accept the excuse.
The committee directed the NAB chief to review his decision and sent all its correspondence on the matter to the National Assembly speaker.
However, later in the day, the committee directed him to appear before it this Friday but later changed the date to May 22, Tuesday.
PTI MNA Arif Alvi, a member of the committee, remarked that the NAB chief should not be disrespected like this and claimed he was being pressured by the ruling lawmakers.
The probe
On May 8, the anti-graft body had ordered an inquiry against Nawaz and others for allegedly laundering $4.9 billion to India. According to a NAB statement, the chairman took notice of a media report which made the claims citing a World Bank report.
However, the World Bank clarified that its report did not mention names or amounts, neither alleged money laundering.
SBP rejects $4.9 billion remittances to India
In a press release issued on September 21, 2016, the State Bank of Pakistan had rejected the estimates of $4.9 billion remittances from Pakistan to India.
“This number is given in Migration and Remittances Factbook 2016 prepared by the Global Knowledge Partnership on Migration and Development (KNOMAD).”
The State Bank press release added that the Factbook data on bilateral remittance flows were estimates and not the actual flows which are based on a number of assumptions about the migrant stock, per worker income, etc.
“The methodology used to estimate these numbers is based on a World Bank’s Working Paper by Ratha, Dilip, and William Shaw ( South-South migration and remittances. No. 102. World Bank Publications, 2007). This methodology has serious issues, particularly in case of Pakistan, as also acknowledged by the authors themselves stating that “Interpreting the meaning of migrant stocks also presents some difficulties. Pakistanis in India and Russians in Ukraine became migrants following partition of the original country.”
The State Bank thus concluded that the study was clearly flawed as the migrants at the time of Indo-Pak partition in 1947 had become Pakistani citizens. The State Bank categorically rejected such estimates as there were contrary to facts and did not make sense.
