More generals in the dock

Just days after the Supreme Court held two former army generals guilty of manipulating the 1990 elections, three former army generals were grilled by National Accountability Bureau (NAB) investigators on Thursday for their alleged involvement in the award of a lease of 141 acres of Pakistan Railways’ land to Royal Palm Club at throwaway prices.
This was a rare occasion as NAB has been run by military officers and traditionally it only questioned civilian bureaucrats and politicians.
The three retired generals appeared before an investigation team at the NAB headquarters and recorded their statements in the Royal Palm case. The NAB team had issued summons to the three retired generals and two civilian officers.
Lieutenant-General (r) Javed Ashraf Qazi, Lieutenant-General (r) Saeeduz Zafar and Major General (r) Hamid Hassan Butt were thoroughly questioned by the NAB team for “causing a loss of millions” to the national exchequer.
The retired generals have been accused of illegally allocating 140 acres of land on lease belonging to the Pakistan Railways to Royal Palm Club for 49 years.
At the time of the allotment, Qazi was minister for railways, Zafar was the secretary, and Butt was the general manager as the military used to run the Pakistan Railways.
While two civilian officers – former Pakistan Railways finance member Khursheed Ahmad Khan and former Pakistan Railways general manager operations Iqbal Samad Khan – were asked to appear before the NAB team on Monday, November 5, to record their statements.
Following the recording of statements, the retired army officers were confronted by reporters prompting controversy as the retired military officers were in no mood to respond to grilling following their ordeal at the NAB headquarters.
Going beyond the norms of decency, Lt Gen Qazi said to a journalist
“shut up idiot”.
His ‘partner in crime’, Lt Gen Saeeduz Zafar said the journalists were holding a media trial of the military generals.
He also mocked the people’s mandate by saying that the masses should elect Almas Bobby, chief of the Shemale Association, in the coming elections.
NAB spokesman Zafar Iqbal had earlier told reporters that a new agreement had been signed in September this year between Pakistan Railways and the club’s management on the directives of NAB under which an additional amount of Rs16 billion was being paid to the PR.
However, the NA’s Public Accounts Committee had called for the agreement’s cancellation, calling for a fresh bidding for the land and disciplinary action against former Railways bosses who had endorsed the agreement.
A report issued by the NA’s Special Committee on Railways on the allotment of land for setting up Royal Palm Golf and Country Club in Lahore reveals a number of financial and administrative irregularities and recommends prosecution of all members of PR’s executive committee.
On the committee’s directives, the Federal Investigation Agency started the investigation, but later the case was referred to NAB. NAB also sought all the records of the Pakistan Railways from the FIA when it took over the case. The special committee’s report said the land had been allotted at a nominal price, causing a huge loss to the exchequer because the land utilisation charge was reduced from Rs52.43 per square yard to only Rs4. The report said construction of a hotel was not mentioned in the terms of reference (TOR) completed on April 20, 2001. “There was no mention of construction of a hotel in TOR evaluation form filled between April 17 and April 20, 2001, and on the basis of this evaluation the land was awarded to the lessee as the executive committee’s approval was given on the same date,” the report said. On a suo motu notice, the Supreme Court completed hearing on the case in March last year, but it has yet to issue a judgment.
NHA officials: Meanwhile, NAB Chairman Admiral (r) Fasih Bokhari on Thursday presided over a meeting of the executive board in which it was decided that an inquiry be authorised into a case against the National Highway Authority (NHA) officials. The accused had been alleged for misuse of authority and violation of Public Procurement Rules (PPRA) in awarding the tender of five toll plazas (Iqbal Shaheed, Haro, Mandra, Tarraki and Jhelum) in September 2011.
NAB observed that the bidding process was in violation of the PPRA rules and advised the NHA under its prevention regime to re-tender the five toll plazas on priority. The NHA was warned to take corrective measures to ensure transparency and impartiality in the light of PPRA Rules 2004. “A clear cut violation of PPRA Rules 2004 was again observed by NAB in the re-tendering process. The NHA ignored NAB’s direction three times,” said a NAB statement. NAB Awareness and Prevention Division, vide its letter dated October 2, clearly mentioned that the subject tendering tantamount to mis-procurement under Public Procurement Rules 2004 and misuse of authority under Section 9 of NAO 1999 as major violations and irregularities had been observed. The project has been halted for the time being on the direction of the A&P Division.