—PML-N says will continue to protest against Shehbaz’s ‘unlawful, unconstitutional’ arrest
LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) President Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday said that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) could not prove a single penny’s worth of corruption against him.
After being remanded into NAB’s custody for another 14 days, he was speaking to local media outside an accountability court in Lahore and said that he calls officials from the anti-graft body himself to question him.
Speaking about the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) led government, Shehbaz said, “Their performance in the last two months has proven that the promises they made were hollow.”
PML-N spokesperson Marriyum Aurangzeb, while speaking to the media outside the court, said, “The government is scared because of what happened on October 14 by-polls and will remain so till they remain in power.”
Further, PML-N leader Rana Sanaullah announced that the party will protest in the National and Punjab Assembly against Shehbaz’s “unlawful and unconstitutional” arrest.
Earlier in the day, an accountability court granted NAB a 14-day extension in the physical remand of the former Punjab chief minister in the Ashiana Housing Scheme case.
Shehbaz is accused of ordering the cancellation of award of contract of Ashiana-i-Iqbal to successful bidder Chaudhry Latif and Sons, leading to award of the contract to Lahore Casa Developers, a proxy group of Paragon City Private Limited, which resulted in the loss of approximately Rs193 million
He is also accused of directing the Punjab Land Development Company (PLDC) to assign the Ashiana project to the Lahore Development Authority (LDA), resulting in the award of contract to the Lahore Casa developers, causing the loss of Rs715 million and the ultimate failure of the project.
NAB has also accused Shahbaz of directing the PLDC to award the consultancy services of the Ashiana project to Engineering Consultancy Services Punjab (ECSP) for Rs192 million while the actual cost was supposed to be Rs35 million as quoted by Nespak.