Lahore High Court Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial on Tuesday referred the petitions seeking quashment of three corruption references prepared by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) against the Sharifs, to a referee judge after the division bench hearing the matter gave a dissenting order.
The division bench comprising Justice Khawaja Imtiaz Ahmad and Justice Farrukh Irfan Khan heard three petitions titled Ittefaq Foundries Limited etc, Hudabia Papers etc and Shahmim Akhtar etc versus the Federation of Pakistan, the National Accountability Bureau and the accountability court judge, Rawalpindi, at the LHC Rawalpindi Bench.
The bench differed on the point whether there was no necessity or requirement to give observations that NAB authorities were competent to proceed against the petitioners if investigation was initiated again.
The matter was referred to the chief justice by the senior judge who had nominated Justice Sheikh Najamul Hassan to decide the query.
While Justice Farrukh Irfan Khan appended a note that NAB was competent to proceed against the petitioners, if the investigation was initiated again according to law mainly on the ground that 12 years had elapsed, it would not only amount to give a premium to prosecution of their own faults but also provide them another opportunity ostensibly to fill up their lacunas and equip them with better tools for combating and victimizing petitioners at the hands of NAB.
Advocate Akram Sheikh represented the petitioners.
In its references, NAB accused the Sharifs of corruption of Rs 642.743 million in the Hudaibya Paper Mills.
The second reference – the state versus Nawaz Sharif, etc. – relates to the Raiwind assets. The main allegation is that the accused had acquired vast tracts of land upon which palatial houses and mansions were built with resources which appeared to be grossly disproportionate to their known sources of income. Apart from Nawaz Sharif, his mother is an accused in this case.
In the state versus Ittefaq Foundries case, Nawaz Sharif, Abbas Sharif and Kamal Qureshi are accused of committing corruption of Rs 1,063 million. The main allegation in the case is that Ittefaq Foundries Ltd obtained cash finance from the National Bank.