Graft hearing against Sharifs adjourned till 9th owing to judge’s ill health

ISLAMABAD: An accountability court on Friday adjourned hearing of the Avenfield properties reference against former premier Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz and son-in-law retired Captain Safdar.

The Avenfield reference, which is based on a reference filed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in light of the Supreme Court’s July 28’s verdict in Panama Papers case, pertains to the Sharif family’s London apartments.

Accountability Court-I Judge Mohammad Bashir, who has been conducting corruption proceedings against the Sharif family since September last year, could not preside over Friday’s hearing as he was unwell.

As a result, the hearing was adjourned until April 9 by duty judge Malik Arshad.

Sharif, his daughter and son-in-law turned up in the court and left shortly after the hearing was postponed.

During Friday’s hearing, Nawaz’s counsel Khawaja Harris was expected to continue his cross-examination of Wajid Zia, the Federal Investigation Agency additional director who headed the Panama case joint investigation team (JIT) which probed the Sharif family’s assets last year.

It would have been the eighth time Zia was cross-examined after having recorded his statement in the case over six hearings earlier.

At the last hearing on Thursday, Wajid Zia told the accountability court that Nawaz Sharif’s salary at his son Hassan Nawaz’s company, Capital FZ, was more than the stated salary on the employment contract.

As Nawaz’s defence counsel, Khawaja Harris, continued his cross-examination, Zia had said that the actual salary of Nawaz was AED100,000 but was shown as AED10,000 in the company’s employment contract. Harris’ questioning on Thursday was focused on the former premier’s employment contract, which became the basis for his dismissal from the office of prime minister.

Harris probed Zia on whether the JIT head knew who had changed the former prime minister’s income in the company documents, to which Zia replied in the negative and added that as the contract was not prepared in front of him and claimed that the document was thoroughly examined by the investigation team.

During Wednesday’s hearing, Wajid Zia had presented seven Mutual Legal Assistance (MLAs) documents in the accountability court, stating that the Supreme Court (SC) had kept Volume X of the JIT’s report sealed.

During Tuesday’s hearing, the court had directed Wajid Zia to approach the apex court for obtaining the JIT report’s Volume X.