Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has categorically rejected all accusations levelled against the Sharifs by former Mehran Bank president Younas Habib and announced suing him for taking his party’s leadership’s name in the Mehrangate scandal.
“Everybody knows that a powerful man sitting in Islamabad is behind the plot and Younis Habib is being used as an instrument,” Shahbaz said in a hurriedly-called press conference at Model Town on Wednesday. He said he was not speaking as the Punjab chief minister but on behalf of the PML-N and his brother Nawaz Sharif. “We have constituted a panel of lawyers to launch legal action against Younis Habib to unmask the real conspirators behind the game,” he said, adding that after winning the case, compensation amount would be doled out to charity.
Shahbaz divulged that schemers had stirred up fake allegations to intimidate the PML-N for raising voice against the government’s rampant corruption and the NRO cases, but he warned that they were mistaken as the PML-N never felt threatened. “We don’t give importance to the statement of Younis Habib as he is notorious for such plots. Moreover, the list of his crimes is too long; that is why he can’t be trusted in any sense as he has changed his statements four times,” Shahbaz said. He termed the accusations of Younis Habib as the biggest lies of the century.
The Punjab CM said, “Younis Habib has said that he sent me the amount by TT. Then he changed his stance and said he sent me the money through Asif Jamshaid. However, Younis is unable to produce any evidence to prove his claim.” About Asif Jamshaid, Shahbaz said the person was sacked on Rs 8 million misappropriations, but the PPP government awarded him the slot of MD of the Bank of Punjab in 1994. “I terminated him in 1997 and he fled the country to ward off corruption cases,” Shahbaz said. He said how it could be possible that official account was opened when our government had been overthrown in 1993. The innumerable contradiction exposed the fact that there were no more than lame accusations to vilify party leadership, he added.
Bring it on, says Habib: ISLAMABAD: Former chairman of the defunct Mehran Bank Younis Habib said on Wednesday he was ready to face any suit for damages brought against him by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). Earlier in the day, Habib filed a petition in the Supreme Court demanding reimbursement of “his money, lavished on politicians”. During the hearing of the Asghar Khan case by a three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Habib submitted an affidavit based on the statements of former generals, Aslam Baig and Asad Durrani, in which he prayed that an amount was paid to political parties in 1990 to prevent the PPP’s way to power. The attorney general informed the SC that nothing was classified in what was earlier touted as “classified statements” by generals Naseerullah Babar, Mirza Aslam Baig and Asad Durrani. The Supreme Court also announced that an appropriate order would be passed regarding making these ‘classified statements’ public at an appropriate time, during the next hearing of the case. Online
Shahbaz has heard enough, will sue Habib now!
