The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) seems to have lost the plot. The tax amnesties of 2018 and 2019 both provided that if assets were declared under them, there would be no enquiry into the sources of income, after taxes were paid on them at a fixed rate. Yet that is exactly what NAB is trying to overturn, using its own authority under the NAB law. NAB has issued notices to almost half a dozen members of the Federal Board of Revenue, asking them to appear before it with information about the properties declared under the scheme by seven people belonging to a political family of KP. This would put the taxmen in the unenviable position of withholding information from NAB. Interestingly, all those receiving notices are senior to the FBR Chairman, and are with him in consideration for promotion from Grade 21 to Grade 22, against three posts vacant in that scale. If he is not promoted, and one of the others is, his position would become very odd.
The manoeuvrings of the bureaucrats aside, an important legal issue has arisen. Does an amnesty by the FBR have any value if NAB, or any other department for that matter, can ask for information given on the assumption that the FBR has the duty of keeping it confidential? NAB is already known for its willingness to act as the government’s tool against political opponents. Its ability to demand information from the FBR would have wide-ranging implications for its ability to act against politicians.
When laws clash, one solution would be to leave it to the courts to decide. A more proper solution would be for the legislature to reconcile the laws. If indeed there is to be a revision of the NAB Ordinance, it is only meet that this be done through a process which includes the Opposition, several stalwarts of which have been victims of NAB in the recent past. The NAB Ordinance has only been viewed for internal inconsistencies. It seems that it needs to be seen against the backdrop of other laws. Conflicts must be eliminated, or else they will be exploited, and not by politicians.
