PAC recommends removal of Chairman Missing Persons Commission Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal from his position
ISLAMABAD, July 07 (SABAH): Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has hinted at issuing arrest warrant against ex-chairman National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal over harassing Tayyaba Gul if he remains absent from the next committee too. PAC has recommended removal of Chairman Missing Persons Commission Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal from his position.
The Public Accounts Committee meeting held here on Thursday with its Chairman Noor Alam Khan in the chair.
Tayyaba Gul, a woman who was allegedly a part of the 2021 video leak controversy, involving the former head of NAB who she alleges threatened her with dire consequences.
The PAC said that it has sent a recommendation to Prime Minister Mian Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif for removal of former head of NAB as the chairman of Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances.
The committee directed the acting chairman NAB to investigate the matter of harassment of the woman, saying such issues are intolerable. It observed that the officials against whom there are allegations, first information reports (FIRs) will be filed against them, adding the record of these FIRs will be sent to Chief Justice and Prime Minister. It further warned that the people who tore clothes of the women would be taught a lesson.
The committee further directed to instantly suspend the services of the officials named in the case and keep them suspended unless investigations against them are concluded.
During the proceedings of the committee meeting, she revealed that former chairman NAB used to threaten her that he will destroy her life within a minute.
Tayyaba Gul lamented that a false reference was filed against her, adding that her version was not recorded. “I met Javed Iqbal during a meeting regarding missing persons,” she said, adding when she asked him not to call her repeatedly, “he got angry.”
“My number was written on the request filed for the missing person, and he [Iqbal] kept calling me time and again,” she said, recalling that Iqbal used to tell her that if she doesn’t respond, no meeting would be held.
Commenting on her intention behind making the video, she said: “I recorded Javed Iqbal because he was a very powerful official and I wanted to expose him.”
Tayyaba Gul added that Iqbal warned her that he would ‘ruin her life within a minute’ if he sees her in any of his offices.
“My husband and I were arrested under the direction of former chairman of NAB. I was arrested by male officers and cannot even share the barbarity that I endured during the car ride,” she added.
She went on to say that she was transported to Lahore without a transit remand. “When I was presented before Director-General Lahore NAB Major (retd) Saleem Shehzad, my clothes were all torn and my body had several bruises,” she said, adding that during the search, on the directions of Shehzad, her clothes were taken off.
The NAB chairman was summoned for Thursday’s meeting after Noor Alam Khan, quoting Defense of Human Rights Pakistan (DHR) Chairperson Amina Msood Janjua, had a day earlier accused Javed Iqbal – who is heading the National Commission for Missing Persons — of harassing a woman who had appeared at one of the sessions of the commission on missing persons.
Tayyaba Gul said that Iqbal’s personal staff officer Rashid Wani, from the missing person commission, was his facilitator. “Neither could I file first information report (FIR) nor did any court listen to my plea,” she added.
As the meeting went on, the committee chairman said that Javed Iqbal has informed him through a letter that he won’t be able to make it on Thursday as he had left for Eidul Azha vacation to Quetta and will come back after Eidul Azha. PAC Chairman Noor Alam Khan said that it is his intension to issue the warrants of Javed Iqbal.