‘Sharifs submitted fake documents’

ISLAMABAD: JIT head Wajid Zia on Tuesday completed his testimony in the Avenfield apartments’ reference, which took six hearings, before an accountability court, and said the Sharif family submitted fake documents to mislead the Supreme Court.

Khawaja Haris and Amjad Pervaiz – the counsels for Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz and Capt (retd) Safdar – will now cross-examine him today (Wednesday).

The court Tuesday allowed submission of three additional documents as evidence, which was earlier refused after the defence raised strong objections over it.

The three documents were: an authorisation letter dated June 19, 2017 on Mutual Legal Assistance (MLA) from the attorney general to Wajid; a letter dated July 4, 2017 by Attorney General Chamber Government of British Virgin Islands (BVI) to Wajid in connection with the MLA request; and a reply by Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani to the JIT in connection with Panama Papers proceedings.

The defence raised strong objection over admissibility of these documents and said the prosecution witness submitted the same very late.

The accountability court judge, Muhammad Bashir, asked Wajid why the June 19 letter was not submitted earlier, to which he replied that it was issued after the Supreme Court had directed the attorney general, allowing the JIT to contact the BVI authorities.

Wajid said the BVI authorities had responded to the JIT on the basis of which it concluded that Maryam Safdar was the beneficial owner of BVI companies owning the Avenfield apartments and the trust deeds presented before the apex court were fake and had been tempered with.

He said Hussain Nawaz, Hassan Nawaz and Maryam had submitted their responses before the Supreme Court in the shape of two trust deeds – one for the two BVI companies those were Nelson and Neiscol and another for Coomber finance. The trust deed was signed by Maryam Nawaz as trustee, Hussain as beneficial owner and Captain Safdar as a witness, he added.

According to Wajid, Neilson and Nescol bearer shares certificates owned the Mayfair apartments and these were dated 1993 and 1996. When possession of these flats was taken between 93 and 96, Hussain was a student, studying in London.

Nawaz and his sons had also stated in their statements that the Avenfield Apartment No 16 was in exclusive use of Nawaz except for a brief period when Mian Sharif was in London for treatment in 1996. They had submitted before the Supreme Court that they were paying ground rent, utility and other service charges of the flats.

Talking about a link between the offshore companies, Wajid said the trust deed regarding Neilson and Nescol charged the Avenfield properties to provide a loan to Coomber. As per financial statements of Hassan, Coomber then provided loan to Que Holdings that was also owned by Hassan, he added.

According to the JIT head, the Que Holding then in 2008 provided loan to Quint Paddington, another offshore company. Quint Paddington also provided with loan by the Capital FZE whose owner was Hassan and Nawaz was an employee of the company.

The trust deed of Neilson and Nescol were quite similar to each other. In one of the trust deeds, the JIT observed overwriting from 2004 to 2006. It also noticed that 2006 was a vital year because of the change in legislation of BVI Act 2004. As per new law, the bearer share had to be deposited by a custodian in 2006 and details of the owner to custodian as well. This meant that the identity of the holders of the bearer share was no longer possible to remain anonymous.

The JIT keeping in view the importance of 2006 took two actions. It hired the services of Quist Solicitors. Since the two trust deeds were verified by the law firm of Jeremy Freeman, so the JIT through Quist, solicited response of the Freeman Box on the two trust deeds with relation to the letter attached with the deeds. Freeman in its response said that they have seen the original documents and they were same as the photocopies.

The JIT also decided to get forensic examination of the documents through Robert William Radley. In view of Radley’s report, it summoned Maryam on July 5, 2017, asking her to produce original trust deeds that she did.

According to Wajid, the photocopies to the trust deeds were also submitted by Hassan and they proved to be fake and falsified documents. Hussain had said that Maryam never had the possession of bearer shares certificates.