ISLAMABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Wednesday gave a clean chit to Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif in the Toshakhana vehicle reference.
The anti-graft body, in its report, has requested an accountability court in Islamabad to acquit the former premier. The court had directed NAB to include the PML-N leader in the investigation.
The court may acquit Nawaz Sharif from the Toshakhana reference, the NAB stated in its report submitted before the court today, highlighting that the car in question was not a part of the Toshakhana at the time of purchase by the former prime minister.
According to the anti-corruption body’s findings, the Saudi government gifted a car to then-prime minister Nawaz in 1997 which he deposited in Toshakhana.
Later in 2008, the report mentioned, then-premier Yusuf Raza Gilani offered the PML-N supremo to buy the same car.
Therefore, Nawaz bought the car not from the Toshakhana, but from the federal transport pool, the report maintained, adding that the vehicle was not purchased using a fake bank account.
The development comes a month after NAB sought respite from the graft court in Islamabad for submission of the report in the Toshakhana case against President Asif Ali Zardari, former premiers Nawaz and Gilani, and others.
