SC orders NAB to probe PSM corruption case

Contempt notice issued to Malik for ‘unnecessary transfers’

Statesman Report

ISLAMABAD: Announcing its verdict in the suo-motu case regarding corruption worth Rs26.5 billion in Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM), the Supreme Court of Pakistan has ordered that the case be transferred to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) from the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Wednesday.

A three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry directed the director-general of FIA to hand over all investigation records to NAB.

The court expressed lack of trust in the investigation conducted by the FIA.

The Supreme Court directed NAB's chairman to supervise the inquiry and told him to conclude it within three months. The court also directed him to submit a compliance report every 15 days.

Bail of all the accused in the case was also annulled.

The Supreme Court issued a contempt of court notice to Interior Minister Rehman Malik for "unnecessary transfers" of officials conducting the probe, on December 17, 2009.

The court sought a reply from Malik within two weeks when the next hearing of Supreme Court will take place.

The PSM's chief law officer Raja Owais Mehmood told DawnNews that apart from the former chairman other key suspects would also be investigated.

Earlier in March, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court had reserved its judgment on the case relating to corruption in the PSM, which had suffered a whopping loss of Rs26.5 billion in 2008-09 alone.

In August 2006, nine-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, had reversed the sale of Steel Mills, saying that the privatisation process had been carried out in "indecent haste". It had held that PSM was the most profit-making industrial concern when it was put on sale.

The court had also taken suo-motu notice on firing of former PSM chairman Moeen Aftab Sheikh without issuing a show cause notice. He was fired by the Establishment Division on the advice of the Prime Minister's Secretariat because of heavy losses suffered by the mills.