FIA nabs two missing Customs officials

KARACHI: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Friday disclosed the arrest of two officials of the Pakistan Customs who had reportedly gone missing from the Jinnah International Airport last week.

The arrested Customs officials, who have been accused of involvement in smuggling, also reportedly revealed names of the department’s senior officials involved in the scam.

Tariq Mehmood and Yawar Abbas, who were posted at the Anti-Smuggling Organisation of the Customs, had reportedly gone missing from the airport while travelling to Islamabad a week ago.

Both the officials along with three collectors of Customs — Saqif Saeed, currently posted as Afghan Transit Trade director; Usman Bajwa, collector at the export collectorate; and Amir Thaeem, collector enforcement have been booked by the FIA Anti-Corruption Circle for allegedly receiving kickbacks to facilitate transport of smuggled goods, including betel nut.

On Friday, the FIA investigation officer produced the two arrested officials before a District South judicial magistrate and sought their physical remand for interrogation. Granting the request, the magistrate handed over the suspects’ custody to the FIA for two days with a direction to produce them on the expiry of their remand.

According to the FIR, a copy of which is available with The News, an FIA team, acting on information, conducted a raid in the domestic lounge of the Jinnah International Airport on July 13 and arrested Mehmood and Abbas who were travelling to Islamabad on a two-day personal visit.

It stated that during a search of the official vehicle of the suspects parked in the airport’s parking lot, Rs5.43 million, 2,406 US dollars and 6,100 UAE dirhams were found and the officials failed to give any plausible reply and voluntarily admitted that the amount was ‘speed money’, which was collected by them from the Customs check post in Mochko, District Keamari, to distribute it among various Customs officials through some collectors, additional collectors, deputy collectors, superintendents and other officials.

“The monthly collection from all Customs check posts i.e. Mochko, Mach Goth, Sohrab Goth and Ghaggar Phatak is approximately Rs40 to 50 million,” the FIR read, claiming that the monthly collection for facilitating smuggling of betel nut was around Rs60 million.

It said both the suspects during initial interrogation confessed to their involvement in facilitating the transport of smuggled goods from border areas of Balochistan to Karachi via land routes in an organised manner.

The agency said the suspects also disclosed the names of other Customs officers who were the beneficiaries of bribes received from smugglers.

Furthermore, the FIR said the detained officials admitted that former Anti-Smuggling Organisation (ASO) director Usman Bajwa had also received a bribe of approximately Rs160 million in March and April 2023 in the form of cash and gold.

Disclosing the names of senior Customs officials who allegedly received a major share from the money collected at various posts for facilitating smugglers, the FIR stated Saeed was posted as the ASO director in 2020 and started “organised smuggling network and posted his trusted accomplices in anti-smuggling role, who were collecting the speed money from different smugglers”.

Bajwa, the FIR disclosed, kept facilitating the smugglers to carry on their activities and received huge bribe amounting to Rs100 million per month approximately. It said Thaeem took over as the ASO director in February 2023 and also “kept providing the umbrella to the smugglers of miscellaneous goods as well as betel nut /chhallia.”

The FIR also stated: “Accused Tariq Mehmood has disclosed that one Imran Noorani is running the smuggling network of betel nut from border areas of Balochistan to Karachi and further distributes the smuggled betel nut /chhallia to other consumers / buyers. Imran Noorani is also running Challia factory in the name and style of Sunny Products.”

The case has been lodged on behalf of the state through sub-inspector Ghulam Murtaza Kaka under the Section 5(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1947 read with the Section 156(8)(89) of the Customs Act 1969 and Section 109 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).