- Action taken after lack of cooperation from department despite NAB’s repeated requests to furnish documents
- Info secretary claims that subordinates disobeyed orders to hand over documents
- Documents likely to implicate former info minister Sharjeel Memon in corruption scandal
KARACHI: A National Accountability Bureau (NAB) team raided Sindh Information and Archives Department on Friday in order to recover certain documents related to the advertisements given to various media outlets by the government in the years 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018.
The sources said that the raid was conducted at the Information Department’s Advertisement Wing after which the team interrogated Advertisement Director Syed Zulfikar Shah and Deputy Director Syed Azeem Shah, both of whom are said to be relatives of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) leader Nasir Hussain Shah, for several hours and took away all the records along with them.
Soon after the NAB authorities left the information department, both the director and deputy director started telling people that every document has been taken away and the department is left with no official documents which included details regarding the advertisements, payment schedules, outstanding dues of newspapers and etc
While talking to Pakistan Today, the Information and Archives Secretary Abdul Rasheed Solangi confirmed the news related to NAB authorities’ raid at the department in which the official documents were taken away. “No arrest has been made so far”, he added.
According to the details, a few days ago, the NAB authorities had forwarded multiple letters to Information and Archives secretary to handover the advertisements’ record of the past four years.
The secretary had repeatedly directed Advertisement director and deputy director to furnish the required documents and send them to NAB for further investigation, however, both of them failed to do so.
Prior to the raid, dozens of complaints were received by NAB authorities against the director and deputy director after which the advisor to the Chief Minister on Information and Archives Barrister Murtaza Wahab had also conducted a raid at the advertisement wing and found illegal activities and also warned the officials to mend their ways but of no avail.
The advertisement wing is considered to be the hotspot for powerful officials who are issuing advertisement to dozens of dummy newspapers in return of 50 per cent commission on a daily basis, sources said
It is worth mentioning that the raid has come as part of PPP’s leader and Sindh former information minister Sharjeel Inam Memon and several others being tried in an accountability court on corruption charges.
Soon after PPP’s young leader Barrister Murtaza Wahab took over the post of advisor, clear instructions were communicated to all the officials mainly, to Advertisement director and deputy director that no corrupt practices would be tolerated at any cost.
Also, an official order was also issued that no officer shall stay at the office after 5 pm, who were used to remain in the offices till late in the nights.
According to sources, the same situation happened when an incident of fire erupted at the information department in which it was claimed that the entire records got fire and they had no official data of payments to newspapers.
