LAHORE: An accountability court on Thursday extended the judicial remand of senior bureaucrat Fawad Hassan Fawad, former Lahore Development Authority (LDA) director general (DG) Ahad Cheema and five others in the Aashiana Housing Scheme scam by 14 days.
As per the details, Accountability Court Judge Munir Ahmad conducted the proceedings during which Fawad, Cheema, Shahid Shafiq Faridi, Imtiaz Haider, Bilal Qidwai and others were produced in the court.
The court, extending the judicial remand of all the accused, directed the National Accountancy Bureau (NAB) to produce them again on December 13.
BACKGROUND:
NAB has filed a corruption reference against Cheema and others over their alleged involvement in the scam whereas one hasn’t yet been filed against Fawad.
According to the reference, the former LDA DG caused a loss of Rs660 million to the national exchequer. As a result, the cost of the project increased to Rs3.4 billion, while 61,000 people who had applied for plots in the project also suffered.
It is pertinent to note that NAB has also arrested Opposition Leader in National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif in connection with the scam.
NAB has alleged that the Rs14 billion contract for the housing scheme was won by a construction company called Chaudhry Latif and Sons, but the then Punjab chief minister Shehbaz Sharif and his aides had awarded it to “ineligible” Lahore Casa Developers.
Due to the alleged illegal cancellation of the contract, the government had to pay damages to the contractor. The cancellation of the contract had also delayed the project, resulting in a cost escalation of billions of rupees.
