KARACHI: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Karachi has arrested two customs officials of MCC Quetta for abusing the ‘vehicles amnesty scheme’ launched in March 2013, while three more officials of MCC Quetta are booked as absconders in the FIR lodged against five of them.
These officials were reportedly cleared vehicles under the amnesty, which were not even physically present in the country. It was known a large number of vehicles were cleared, which were in Japan at the time of clearance. The authorities did not extend the timeline for the scheme contrary to expectations; therefore, certain elements in nexus with customs officials got cleared vehicles, which were to be smuggled into the country later via Afghanistan.
The arrested inspectors of MCC Quetta include Zakarya and Tanveer while three more inspectors of MCC Quetta namely Moosa, Zehri and Akram are absconding.
Director General of Post Clearance Audit (PCA) Nadir Khan Hoti has initiated a thorough audit pertaining to the assessment and clearance of vehicles under the amnesty scheme. Director PCA Karachi Gul Rehman has two formed two teams for the purpose of this audit. Team headed by Deputy Director Rashid Munir and comprising Principal Appraiser Javed Hasan, Appraising Officers Rana Naseer, AbdulAziz and Zulfiqar Zaman are scrutinizing the vehicles cleared from Customs Karachi.
Team headed by Deputy Director Sajid Baloch and comprising Inspectors Mohammad Hashim, Mohammad Essa, Zubair Awan and Makhdoom Aslam would audit the clearance of vehicles from Quetta.
Director PCA Lahore Ahmed Rauf is conducting the audit of vehicles cleared under amnesty scheme 2013 from central Pakistan.
Director Kamal Mazhar Minhas is conducting the audit of vehicles cleared under amnesty scheme 2013 from northern Pakistan.