A day before their appearance before the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in Paragon City scam, a division bench of the Lahore High Court on Monday granted protective bail to former railways minister Kh Saad Rafique and his brother ex-health minister Khwaja Salman Rafique. The bench granted protective bail to both till October 24 on depositing surety bonds of Rs 500,000 each. Earlier, the Islamabad High Court had rejected an application requesting for a protective bail for Kh Saad and Kh Salman. They both are required to appear before the NAB today for investigation. Both former federal and provincial ministers appeared before LHC with their counsel. The counsel pleaded that they had nothing to do with the Paragon City as they had already provided the NAB with all information required by interrogators but they were being summoned time and again with mala fide intension. He submitted that the NAB had lost its credibility and its independence had been compromised for irrelevant consideration. He claimed that since the illegal arrest of opposition leader in National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif, it had become a matter of public knowledge that NAB officials had been “abusing the process of law for political victimization”. He also alleged that the NAB had become a stooge in the hands of incumbent government and resorted to victimization of political opponents including the petitioners. He said that his clients had apprehensions that the NAB would also arrest them on their appearance before its investigation team. He requested the court to grant them protective bail so that they could approach the court of competent jurisdiction in case the NAB issued their arrest warrants. Published in Daily Times, October 16th 2018.