Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Accountability Barrister Shahzad Akbar Thursday said that a sophisticated network of money laundering was being run from Punjab Chief Minister Secretariat under the patronage of former Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, who often claims not committing even a penny corruption.

Talking to media, he said a sum of over 7 billion had been laundered by just one company Good Nature Trading Company through 200 fake Telegraphic Transfer (TTs) and assets of Salman Shahbaz Sharif had increased by over 8,000 times in last one decade. A new business empire was established by utilizing the corruption amount through a network of fake TTs, which was totally separate from the Sharif family’s business of Ittefaq Group.

Sharing details of money laundering, he said the modus operandi of money laundering was Shahbaz Sharif established a fake company Good Nature Trading Company and appointed his front men Nisar Gill as Director Political Affairs in CM Secretariat and Ali Ahmed as Director Policy CM Punjab and they did money laundering on behalf of Shahbaz family. The fake company was actually run by Salman Shahbaz. The company did Rs 7 billion business, that too on papers.

He said two more characters including Shoaib Qamar and Mansoor Anwar were involved in a money laundering network as cash boys. They used to deposit money in different accounts. They withdrew Rs 2.1 billion cash from the account of Good Nature Company. Rs 16 million were deposited in the account of Shahbaz Sharif, who transferred Ms Tehmina Durrani and the same amount was used for purchasing property in Whispering Pines Villas. The same cash boys deposited Rs 25 million to Salman Shahbaz’s Account after withdrawing from Good Nature Company. Similarly, another amount was transferred to account of Hamza Shahbaz, who transferred it to the account of his wife and utilized the same amount for purchasing properties in Johar Town, Lahore. The remaining amount was stashed away through TTs. The whole process was done in papers.

He said Rs 6.8 billion was withdrawn from Good Nature Company’s account and Rs 4.7 billion and then injected to another company. The control room was in Chief Minister secretariat and some more characters of money laundering network would emerge soon.

He said the details of 190 million pounds (Rs 39 billion) recovered from Property tycoon Mailk Riaz Ahmed could not be divulged as Pakistan have to honour deed of confidentiality committed with the government of United Kingdom. This was civil repatriation and record success of the government of Pakistan. UK government has transferred the recovered amount.

Responding to a question, he said civil recovery was easy in UK and the government was working on it. The salaries of NAB had been increased three times to enable them to concentrate on their duties. He was trying to improve working conditions of FIA for better results.

To another question, Shahzad Akbar said the repatriated 190 pounds had a link with Hassan Nawaz’s property in London.

He urged the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to prosecute the cases and take to logical conclusion. Plea bargain option existed for Nawaz Sharif as the government wanted to recover the money and does not want to keep anyone in jail.

He was still waiting Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif should sue the Daily Mail as claimed by him to preserve the honour and dignity of Pakistan and its people.