Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Meeting the deadline set by the Supreme Court in Panama Papers case verdict, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Friday filed four interim graft references against ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif, his three children and Finance Minister Ishaq Dar in the accountability court of Islamabad.

The references were filed with the Islamabad Accountability Court Registrar Office by a NAB prosecution team headed by Additional Deputy Prosecutor General Sardar Muzaffar Abbasi. The registrar will scrutinise the references and then decide to present them in the accountability courts of Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

According to sources, nine volumes of the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) report have been attached with each reference. During the initial scrutiny, the registrar raised some legal objections, termed the references incomplete and asked NAB to remove the objections. The NAB team then assured him of removing the discrepancies at the earliest. The references were brought to the court in more than a dozen boxes amid tight security. According to a senior official of NAB, the bureau will continue to probe the cases against the Sharif family and submit final references as soon as it gets the documents from other countries through ongoing mutual legal assistance (MLA).

According to NAB spokesperson Nawazish Ali Khan Asim, all the references have been accepted for trial by the registrar office. According to Islamabad Accountability Court Registrar Ahmad Mushtaq Qureshi, the references were almost complete to initiate the trial. He, however, said it might take two to three days to peruse the references, as they contained thousands of documents.

Three of the four references are against ousted premier Nawaz Sharif, his sons Hasan and Hussain, daughter Maryam and son-in-law Capt (r) Safdar, while the fourth is against Dar.

In its executive board meeting on September 7, NAB approved three references against Nawaz Sharif and his children Hasan, Hussain and Maryam. First reference relates to the Avenfield Properties (Flat No 16 and 16-A, 17 and 17-A Avenfield House, Park Lane, London, United Kingdom).

The second reference relates to establishment of Azizia Steel Company and Hill Metal Company, Jeddah. The third reference relates to Flagship Investment Limited and 15 other companies. The fourth reference approved and filed is against Ishaq Dar. It relates to possessing assets beyond known sources of income.

In the light of the JIT report, the apex court on July 28, 2017, disqualified Nawaz Sharif as prime minister and gave NAB six weeks to file the references and the accountability court six months to wrap up proceedings in the high-profile case.

The court also gave NAB the option to file supplementary reference(s) ‘if and when any other asset, which is not prima facie reasonably accounted for, is discovered’. Nawaz Sharif, his children, son-in-law and Ishaq Dar have filed review petitions against the apex court verdict in Panama Papers case, which are pending adjudication. According to legal experts, the Sharif family and Ishaq Dar can face up to 14 years of imprisonment, heavy fines and freezing of property if the accountability court rules that a violation of Section 9 of the NAB Ordinance 1999 has taken place, as suggested in the report of the JIT. Moreover, the accused may also be disqualified from holding public offices for life if found guilty.

According to the JIT report about Avenfield properties, the Sharifs had given contradictory statements about their London flats and found that the flats actually belonged to them since 1993. The report said Hasan Nawaz had contradicted the statement of his brother Hussain Nawaz about the Avenfield apartments, who had earlier stated that only Apartment No 17 was in his possession in 1994. It said that contrarily, Hasan confirmed that three Avenfield apartments (No 16, 16-A and 17) were already in possession of Hussain when he had arrived in London in 1994, while they got the possession of the fourth apartment (17-A) after six months.

Published in Daily Times, September 9^th 2017.