Musharraf says Nisar should be new PM

• Former president says SC, JIT deserve appreciation

Former military ruler and All Pakistan Muslim League (APML) Chairman Pervez Musharraf has said that the Supreme Court and the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) made history and deserve huge applause and appreciation.

“I salute to the bravery and courage of judges and JIT members who ensured transparent and impartial investigation against Sharif family and rendered a judgment that will set a precedent and will deter corruption and corrupt practices in future,” he said while expressing his views about the Supreme Court judgment in Panama Papers case.

Musharraf said that the rest of six people who were found involved should be put on exit control list (ECL) and tried. He expressed his views through a video message after the court announced its judgment. He said that this decision would set an example that no one was above the law and regarding future course of action, if a person has to contest for the public office, he must come clean.

“My party and me fully support this judgment,” he said, adding that this was not an easy task to render a judgment like this. “JIT members completed their work under extreme pressure and they were ‘threatened’ as well,” he claimed. Despite this, they did a marvelous job to dig out the decades old secrets about the empire that was structured at ill-gotten money,” he said.

He said that they (JIT members) deserve appreciation for their tireless efforts. Musharraf demanded that the names of prime minister’s three children, son-in-law Muhammad Safdar, a retired army officer, and Senator Ishaq Dar should be put on ECL and they be tried under the law. Beside Sharif family, there were several others who looted money and escaped with an ease, he said without sharing name of anyone.

He said that they should also face the same course of action. “After I left in 2008, it wondered that how Asif Ali Zardari and Nawaz Sharif elected to the prime offices, telling lies to the people and deceiving them while the truth faced failures. But this decision has proved that the truth has to prevail even with a delay. The decision has also exposed the moral and political corruption during 90s in this country,” he said.

Talking to a private TV channel, the former president said that the Supreme Court had given an excellent decision. “Nawaz Sharif has made a rod for his own back. It has now become hard for the entire Sharif family to live in Pakistan because they have disgraced them too much,” he said.

“I am coming to Pakistan soon,” he again claimed. “I have eaten sweet on this decision. Not someone else has hatched conspiracy against Nawaz Sharif but he himself hatched conspiracy against himself,” he said, adding that the army might have felt jubilant over disqualification of Nawaz Sharif.

He said that the opportunities were taking shapes and he would soon come to Pakistan. He wished that former interior affairs minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan should be new prime minister from the Pakistan Muslim League-N.