Shahzad Ahmad

LAHORE - A local accountability court extended the physical remand of former Punjab chief minister Mian Shehbaz Sharif for 14 days after the previous 10-day custody in the Ashiana Iqbal Housing scandal came to an end yesterday.

Shehbaz was produced before the court of Najamul Hassan Bukhari amid tight security.

The ex-CM brought his own files with him and reaching the court started reading them out, rejecting his involvement in the case. However, the court interrupted him saying that it would first hear NAB’s stance.

The NAB lawyer told the court that the accused had expressed ignorance in response to all questions asked by the interrogators.

As the bureau sought a 15-day extension in remand, Shehbaz’s lawyer opposed the request with the argument that the NAB had failed to extract any information from his client during the past 10 days. Also, he said, the former CM had been implicated in the case for political reasons. He said the court should throw out the NAB plea.

Shehbaz himself told the court that no official had investigated him for three days.

The NAB prosecutor said that further investigation in the case was necessary as some other aspects of the case needed to be investigated. He added that other persons had also been summoned in the Ashiana case.

Shehbaz said whenever the NAB summoned him, he appeared before it. He added that he had answered all the questions the NAB had asked. The former chief minister said he was fully cooperating with the NAB in investigation, after which there was no need for more remand.

He denied the allegations of misusing his authority or indulging in any corrupt practice. He said he was called for Saaf Pani and arrested over Ashiana scandal. Shehbaz said accusations against him were baseless and that he had saved the country’s money instead.

Shehbaz is accused of directing LDA to undertake the project of Ashiana Housing Scheme under public-private partnership mode just to give unlawful benefit to M/s Paragon City.

It was allegedly done to give undue benefit of 2,000 kanal state land, worth Rs14 billion, under the garb of remuneration for the construction of flats in Ashiana Iqbal Barki Road Lahore.

In a statement, the NAB accused Shehbaz of misusing authority and acting in connivance with Fawad Hassan Fawad and others for illegally cancelling contact awarded to M/s Chaudhry Latif and Sons and later awarding the same to LDA for infrastructure development of the project.

Meanwhile, during the 10-day interrogation, as per the NAB officials, Mr Shehbaz was inquired about tendering of Ashiana lqbal project but he was adamant and deliberately concealed the name of person who made verbal complaint to him in this respect. The accused also did not reply as to why he accepted the complaint after grievance period. He also failed to reply why he did not refer the matter to PLDC Board who was not only competent in this behalf but also conversant with all relevant facts of the case.

He was inquired why he kept silent on processing of the complaint after having knowledge that complainant bidder was not a genuine bidder and his documents were added in the process after due date. He failed to submit plausible reply in this regard.

He was asked as to why the letter for cancellation of contract was written on 15th March, 2013 before referring the matter to Anti-Corruption Punjab the accused was confronted with disclosure of Fawad Hassan Fawad who had said that accused Shehbaz had directed him to call the management of PLDC for discussing the award of contract. He said he did not remember whether he passed such orders and he needed more time to answer this question, they added.

During interrogation, he revealed for the first time that a second bidding was conducted for the infrastructure development by the PLDC in December, 2013 after cancellation of first bidding process. However, the record shows that even the second bidding was unlawfully intervened and finally halted by Mian Shehbaz Shard on 24 March, 2014.

Meanwhile, Sheikh Alauddin, the former chairman of PLDC Board, joined and revealed that at the time of first bidding he spoke to accused Shehbaz and informed him that one of the directors of PLDC namely Khawaja Mansoor Mazhar had demanded an amount of Rs50 million from the owner of Ch A Latif and Sons who had won the contract. Khawaja Mansoor is the person who allegedly inserted documents of M/s Conpro Services during the pre-qualification process after due date.

Khawaja Mansoor also admitted that he was nominated as director in PLDC Board on the recommendations of Talha Barki who introduced him to Shehbaz Sharif.

The NAB wanted to know during the new 15-day remand that why Shehbaz directed to undertake the project under PPP mode and entrusted it to LDA and why he had given all directions to the then DG LDA, Ahad Khan Cheema.

The NAB prosecutor told the court that since the second bidding had surfaced during this remand, hence all relevant witnesses were required to be associated in order to ascertain the facts and circumstances in which accused unlawfully interfered in the bidding process and ordered to take the project under Public-Private Partnership mode.

He further said accused Shehbaz had committed offences of corruption and corrupt practices with active aid and assistance of private individuals as well as public officials. Accordingly, his physical custody was essential to complete the investigation.

Meanwhile, all routes leading to the sessions court were cordoned off while those unrelated with the court affairs were not allowed to enter the court premises. The lawyers were permitted to enter the court premises after a comprehensive search.

 

 

Court extends Shehbaz’s remand for

14 days