Accountability, investigation for fair trial: Bills to come before NA next week

http://dawn.com/2012/10/07/accountab...-na-next-week/

ISLAMABAD, Oct 6: The government is set to table the Accountability Bill and the Investigation for Fair Trial Bill in the National Assembly next week, insiders in the People’s Party told Dawn.

Although the current National Assembly has four more sessions left in its tentative schedule before completing its five-year term on March 18, the ruling coalition wants to take full advantage of its majority in the house and do the necessary legislation as early possibly, they said.

The sources said the government had its own interest in the long-delayed accountability bill because it would determine how the accountability of public office holders would be done in future and the security establishment had long been pushing it to pass the fair trial bill.

The National Accountability Commission Act, 2010, has been a bone of contention between the PPP and PML-N since its presentation in the National Assembly on April 15, 2009, under the title “the Holder of Public Office (Accountability) Act, 2009”. Its title was changed afterwards.

After deliberating for one year, the NA committee on law and justice, headed by PPP’s Nasim Akhtar Chaudhry, passed the draft of the bill in April 2010 despite the opposition’s protest. The PML-N members in the committee submitted notes of dissent.

On Sept 6, PPP’s chief whip and Federal Minister for Religious Affairs Syed Khurshid Shah and Law Minister Farooq H. Naek handed over its draft to PML-N’s Ishaq Dar and Khwaja Asif. Leaders of the PPP expressed the desire to pass the law with a unanimous vote, but neither side has spoken about the bill since then.

The accountability bill has seen an exhausted discussion. The National Assembly standing committee on law and justice reportedly had held 30 meetings which saw several boycotts, walkouts and altercations between the opposition and treasury benches.

The PML-N is not happy with some clauses of the bill passed by the law and justice committee. The opposition party wants the head of the proposed National Accountability
Commission (NAC) to be a sitting judge of the Supreme Court, but the government favours filling the position either by a sitting or a retired judge or any person qualified to be a judge of the Supreme Court.

The PML-N has also opposed immunity for a public office holder if an individual is found guilty of committing wrongdoing in ‘good faith’. It has also suggested that the commission be allowed to investigate cases dating back to 1947. But the bill proposes that the NAC will not carry out investigations into any crime committed before 1985.

INVASION OF PRIVACY FEARED: The Investigation for Fair Trial Bill, 2012, is meant to allow the law enforcement agencies to use modern techniques and devices against terrorists. If passed in its present shape, emails, SMSs, phone calls and audio-visual recordings will be admissible evidence, while suspects will be held for six months after a warrant is issued by a district and sessions judge in his chambers.

According to the draft, the state will be allowed neither to tap phone calls nor to intercept other private communications in order to catch terrorists. The proposed legislation has already attracted criticism from some quarters for being too intrusive and against the norms of privacy.

In its defence of the new law, the government contends that since the present set of laws neither “comprehensively provide for nor specifically regulate the use of advanced and modern investigative techniques such as covert surveillance and human intelligence, wire tapping and communication interception that are used extensively in other countries, including the US, UK and India which are an indispensable aid to the law enforcement and administration of justice”.

The proponents of the new law believe it will help neutralise and prevent the threat or any attempt to carry out scheduled offences, including offence of terrorism. “It is necessary that law enforcement and other agencies are given certain specific authorisation to obtain evidence in time and only in accordance with law to secure successful prosecution of offenders.”

But the opponents say the law carries many loopholes which, if not plugged, can be misused and seriously affect public privacy.

Since the two bills need a simple majority in the National Assembly and the Senate, the ruling coalition will have no problem in getting them adopted.

Unlike a constitutional amendment which needs a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly — 228 MNAs — and the Senate — 70 Senators — the coalition partners will have to prove a majority on the day of voting on the two bills. If a majority of lawmakers present in the house say ‘yes’ to a simple bill, it stands passed.