LAHORE: Lahore Chamber of Commerce & Industry (LCCI) and National Accountability Bureau (NAB) organized
a joint session on the theme of anti-corruption and character building at the LCCI office on Wednesday.
LCCI President Mian Tariq Misbah, Vice President Tahir Manzoor Chaudhry, Director NAB Syed
Muhammad Husnain, Assistant Director Munazza Tasneem and experts from various sectors spoke
on the occasion. LCCI Executive Committee Members Shahid Nazir and Ali Afzal were also present.
The experts said that corruption was an evil which hits all the sectors hard whether that was economy
or the public interests. It discourages economic activities, local and foreign investments and leads to
poverty.
Syed Muhammad Husnain said the NAB had the mission to eliminate corruption through enforcement
of laws and awareness in the society. While elaborating the functions and operations of NAB, he
highlighted different types of white collar crimes happening in Pakistan. He briefed the participants
about the measures that NAB was taking to bring-back hard earned money of the masses. He said
that corruption means misdoings and misuse of authority for vested interests. He said that NAB aimed
to become a credible, effective, efficient, and dynamic anti-corruption organization to create
corruption-free society.
LCCI President Mian Tariq Misbah said that being the premier business support organization of the
country, Lahore Chamber had always advocated for strong measures for making Pakistan a corruption
free country and acknowledge the importance and efforts of NAB as Pakistan’s apex anti-corruption
organization.
He said that through the event, representatives of business community would be made aware about
the adverse impact of corruption, particularly on the economic progress of an emerging economy like
Pakistan.
The LCCI President said, “we should be concerned over the fact that Pakistan is ranked considerably
low on the Corruption Perceptions Index prepared by Transparency International.” Our country is
consistently slipping down from the last three years in this Index. Pakistan stood at 117th place
in 2018, whereas, in 2019 and 2020, it further went down to 120th and 124th places respectively
out of 180 countries. This low ranking implies that Pakistan is not making sufficient progress towards
tackling the menace of corruption.
He said that at present, there was a wave of curbing corruption according to the vision of Prime Minister
and this drive was gaining momentum with the passage of time. “We fully endorse this drive and expect
that significant measures will be taken to eliminate corruption through a well-rounded approach of
awareness, prevention and enforcement, ” he added.
Mian Tariq Misbah said that private sector’s perspective about the corruption was quite clear and
‘we believe that corruption hits at the foundation of economic activity. The business community views
the corruption in the state organs was damaging to the growth of economy.’ Administrative reforms
are imperative, if the corruption in the system has to be rooted out, he observed.
He said the objectives against corruption could only be achieved if NAB and other departments
concerned both at national and provincial levels work in harmony.