Peers should also hold accountability of politicians: Rabbani

ISLAMABAD: Former Senate chairman Senator Mian Raza Rabbani criticised the reported government decision to establish a committee of industrialists to vet cases that would be taken up by NAB, calling it as discriminatory.“Accountability in Pakistan has become a process of trial by one’s own peers. The civil-military bureaucracy, if and when subjected to accountability, are tried by their own peers. Similarly, the judges of the superior court are subject to Article 209, Constitution, 1973, which denotes an inquiry by their own fellow judges.Now big business will have their cases vetted by the committee of their own peers who would then allow NAB to proceed or otherwise,” he noted here in a statement. He maintained that politicians were the only class of citizens that were being discriminated against and being subjected to arrest, investigation and trial by special NAB Courts under the stringent law.“This discrimination is in total violation of the fundamental rights provided under the Constitution, 1973,” the veteran legislator contended. He emphasised that if all stakeholders were to be subjected to peer trial then members of the Parliament and the provincial assemblies should also have their cases scrutinize before NAB take then up by the Committee of Parliament.The process of accountability, he argued, could only be transparent and result oriented if there was across the board accountability, under one law and one procedure. “I had earlier suggested that there should be a Federal Accountability Commission with representation of all stakeholders to carry out across the board accountability,” he recalled.

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