Islamabad (April 05, 2018): The accountability court on Thursday indicted three co-accused in a reference filed by NAB against Ishaq Dar over assets beyond known means of income.
The proceedings in the case resumed today with Judge Muhammad Bashir in the chair. It is pertinent to mention here that four previous proceedings has passed by without the accused being indicted with different reasons for every hearing.
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During today’s hearing, Judge Mohammad Bashir read out the charges, to which the co-accused pleaded not guilty. All three suspects were present in court today.
However, on Thursday the three co-accused including the former National Bank President Saeed Ahmed, Naeem Mehmood and Mansoor Raza were indicted in the case but they rejected the allegations leveled against them.
The counsel of the accused told the court that they had challenged the high court decision against the accountability court proceedings and pleaded the court to delay the indictment in the case till orders from the apex court.
However, the accountability court judge Muhammad Bashir said that they respect the highest court of law but no order restraining them in this regard has come from there. “Whenever a decision would come against the indictment from the apex court then the proceedings would be dropped,” he said.
The co-accused Mansoor Raza tendered unconditional apology to the judge over the incident in the last hearing and said that the bar office bearer Javed Akber Shah, who had a heated argument with the judge, is no more representing him in the case.
Later the court indicted the three accused and summoned the witnesses including director National Assembly Sher Dil Khan, bank officer Muhammad Azeem, and Abdul Rehman Gondal of another bank in next hearing scheduled for 11 April.
The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) filed an interim reference against Dar in September last year on the Supreme Court’s directives in the Panama Papers case.
In a supplementary reference filed earlier this year, NAB named National Bank of Pakistan President Saeed Ahmed, Naeem Mehmood and Mansoor Rizvi as co-accused. The latter two have been identified as directors of one of Dar’s companies. All three are accused of aiding Dar in opening fictitious bank accounts and transferring money abroad.
The case
Dar, a close aide of Pakistan Muslim League-N chief Nawaz Sharif, is accused of possessing assets disproportionate to his declared sources of income.
NAB filed an interim reference against Dar in September last year in light of the Supreme Court’s July 28, 2017, verdict in the Panama Papers case.
The recently-filed supplementary reference is based on seven volumes and includes the account details of the accused persons, with transactions amounting to $4.06 million, according to NAB’s Special Prosecutor Imran Shafiq.
Dar was re-elected to the Senate of Pakistan earlier this year.
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