Four FATF related bills are extremely urgent. They need to be passed before the APG review, which will drive whether the plenary in October decides to keep Pakistan in the grey or pushes us to "white list" status. Of course, the threat of being black listed continues to exist.
The FATF requirements are time-bound, and the NA session has been extended to accommodate it. But the opposition parties are insisting on a "package deal" with changes to NAB laws. After not having done anything for ten years while in power, this has suddenly become very urgent.
The four urgent bills comprise of two related to the Anti-Terrorism Act, one relates to FATF related UN Security Council obligations, and one related tor Mutual Legal Assistance.
The government wanted to use the lapsed NAB amendment ordinance as the baseline for dialog, but they opposition rejected it as a "non-starter", and presented their own draft of what they want to do to the NAB law, called the "Joint Proposal by PPP and PMLN".
35 amendments to NAB laws have been suggested by the opposition. These include:
1. Change the NAB law effective date to Nov 16th, 1999 - removing the period from 1985 to 1999 from its scope - sweeping the entire 90s decade under the carpet.
2. Term of NAB Chairman be reduced.
1. Change the NAB law effective date to Nov 16th, 1999 - removing the period from 1985 to 1999 from its scope - sweeping the entire 90s decade under the carpet.
2. Term of NAB Chairman be reduced.
3. Amendments that would effectively remove money-laundering from the list of offences under NAB jurisdiction.
4. NAB to only investigate cases where alleged corruption is 1 billion Rupees or higher - Corruption of Rs999,999,999 is not corruption.
4. NAB to only investigate cases where alleged corruption is 1 billion Rupees or higher - Corruption of Rs999,999,999 is not corruption.
5. Information and legal assistance from other countries to investigate money laundering be disconnected from the NAB law and brought under the evidence laws of Qanoon-e-Shahdat. We all know what that would do to Mutual Legal Assistance documents.
6. If someone is convicted by NAB, but appeals are ongoing, that convict would not be prevented from being a member of parliament.
7. The period of 10 years of disqualification for NAB convicts be reduced to 5 years.
7. The period of 10 years of disqualification for NAB convicts be reduced to 5 years.
8. Statute of limitations of 5 years be imposed on NAB cases; effectively NAB will not be empowered to pursue any case from 2015 or earlier. It is pretty rare, as far as I know, for statute of limitations to apply on serious criminal offences.
9. Delete six offences from NAB laws, for example "cheating public at large" and "willful default"
10. No arrest until conviction. Meaning police can arrest an alleged petty thief for investigation, but NAB cannot arrest someone accused of billions of Rupees of corruption.
10. No arrest until conviction. Meaning police can arrest an alleged petty thief for investigation, but NAB cannot arrest someone accused of billions of Rupees of corruption.
SMQ ended his speech with an impassioned appeal to the opposition - very positively and respectfully - to put national interest first, before personal interest. Where consensus was not possible over 10-12 years, it is unrealistic to expect that to happen over 10-12 hours.
He made it clear that, not only would the 35 amendments to NAB laws proposed by the opposition dilute Pakistan's position with FATF, it would be against PTI's position on corruption. Imran Khan will never compromise on corruption.
