ISLAMABAD: A petition filed in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) has accused two senior officers of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) of blackmailing the management committee of a private housing society to receive illegal benefits, reported a local media outlet.
The officers have been accused of using their position as “a tool of blackmailing and got a false reference filed against the management committee on its refusal to bow to their illegal demands”.
The accused are alleged to have worked with illegal land grabbers in order to influence the functioning of the society, which has over 7,000 members.
Charges had been brought against the society by land grabbers in 2014. Those applications were submitted to the director Anti-Corruption Establishment Rawalpindi, director general NAB Rawalpindi and the director general of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA). Subsequent inquiries cleared the society’s management committee of any wrongdoing.
NAB officers ordered an inquiry again in 2015 and launched an investigation of September 30 even though the matter had been cleared and referred to the circle registrar. The petition argues that this highlights that the officials were acting in bad faith. NAB officials later filed a case in the accountability court against the society.
The society’s accounts were frozen on 22 January 2018 without any justification by NAB officials as a retaliatory measure, the petition alleged. It urged the court to de-freeze the accounts.
The IHC has issued notices to the NAB chairman and other officers.
