Avenfield reference: ‘Nawaz has no direct link with London flats’

ISLAMABAD: Investigation Officer (IO) in the Avenfiled Apartments reference, Imran Dogar on Thursday submitted before the Accountability Court (AC) that even if there was no mention of Nawaz Sharif in the documents received from the United Kingdom Central Authority (UKCA), still he was the ‘Benami’ owner of Nielsen and Nescoll that came to their knowledge during investigation however he had no direct linkage with the London flats.

It further came to knowledge that as per documents of financial investigation agency of British Virgin Island (FIA-BVI), Maryam Nawaz is the beneficial owner of Nielsen & Nescoll, two offshore companies that owned the 4 Avenfield London apartments.

During cross-examination while responding to the questions of Nawaz Sharif’s legal counsel Khawaja Haris, Imran Dogar admitted that there is no document of title collected by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) investigation that Nawaz Sharif ever remained owner of any flat. There is also no document to show that Nawaz either remained real or beneficial owner of the Avefiled Apartments. No documents to show that he ever remained registered director, nominee director, shareholder or nominee shareholder of Nielsen and Nescoll. No document either to show that Nawaz ever remained trustee or settler of any trust and no witness testified before the investigation that Nawaz Sharif ever held possession of the bearer shares certificates. There is also no document to show that Nawaz ever done any correspondence regarding Nielsen, Nescoll or Avenfiled properties. Dogar also admitted that there is no evidence to show that Nawaz ever paid utility bills or council tax of the London flats.

Before JIT, apart from the 5 accused persons, 13 others had recorded their statements. The NAB investigation however did not cite any single person out of those 13, as prosecution witness in this matter, Dogar said.

Nawaz Sharif counsel Khawaja Haris Ahmed posed a question to Dogar if any of the witness said anything regarding ownership of the Avenfield properties. To which Dogar replied, “It is white collar crime. In such crimes, there is no direct evidence and there is instead indirect evidence.” Documents submitted to the investigation by the three prosecution witnesses including Securities & Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) registrar Sidra Mansoor, advocate Mazhar Raza Bangash and Muhammad Rasheed connected the accused with the crime, Dogar said. Responding to the questions of advocate Haris, Dogar said that none of the three said anything about the real or beneficial owner of London flats. Sidra Mansoor had submitted annual audited reports of the companies of which she was neither scribe nor executed by him. And he did not record the statements of those who were scribe to those documents and none of the document had any mention of ownership of Avenfiled properties, Dogar said.

Similarly, Muhammad Rasheed also submitted photocopy documents with a covering letter that was addressed to Khawar Ilyas and he didn’t record statement of Ilyas, Dogar said.

Responding to the different questions of defense counsel regarding Mazhar Raza Bangash advocate who had served order of the Justice Queen’s bench division London to the defendants in Pakistan, Dogar said that according to the decision of Justice Queen’s bench and affidavit of Bangash, neither Nawaz Sharif nor his children were defendant in the case pertaining to Al-Towfik Investment Company vs Hudaibya Paper Mills. But Hussain Nawaz, Hassan Nawaz and Maryam were the directors and shareholders of Hudaibya and this way they were connected to the matter.

Dogar admitted that in Justice Queeen’s bench order, there was no mention of Hudaibya as having beneficial interest in the Avenfiled properties. He also admitted that it is written in the affidavit of Shezi Nackvi that Avenfield properties were not mortgaged in Al-Towfik case and these properties were never offered as collateral amount. Shezi Nackvi affidavit also has a mention that Nawaz Sharif had no nexus with any loan or consequent settlement, Dogar also admitted.

Advocate Haris then posed a question if he knew that Shezi Nackvi for his affidavit had relied upon a report of the former interior minister A Rehman Malik that he submitted in September 1998 claiming that Sharif family is the owner of Avenfield properties. IO Dogar said that he knows, JIT had associated A Rehman Malik with its investigation but did not rely upon his statement.

Haris then posed a question if he went to London and it was in his knowledge that Lawrence Radley had written a letter to Salman Akram Raja telling him that his company acted on behalf of purchasers for Avenfield apartments but Sharif family never instructed his company in this regard. “Did you associate Lawrence Radley with your investigation?” To this Dogar replied that his statement was not necessary in view of the fact that flats were purchased through offshore.

About Jeremy Freeman who, as per statements of the accused person, had attested the Nielsen, Nescoll and Coomber group trust deeds, Dogar said that he did not associate him with the investigation because the documents attested by Freeman were not even relied upon by the accused persons.

Dogar tried to establish that the accused, members of Sharif family attached different trust deeds with their applications in the Supreme Court but later in response to the questions of Haris, he admitted that trust deeds were same except from a single page. Responding to another question, Dogar said that Maryam, Hassan and Hussain never stated anywhere that they did not accept the Freeman attested certificate as valid.

At the start of cross-examination, Dogar told AC that NAB Director General (Operations) Zahir Shah had handed over to him the additional documents he received from UKCA that comprised land registry, council tax and utility bills. “I knew that the UKCA representative in Pakistan Osman Ahmed had delivered these documents to Zahir Shah but I did not try to record his statement. To a question as through which channel NAB headquarters received these documents, Dogar said that it was immaterial. He said that he did not prepare a seizure memo for the documents since photocopies were handed over to him and he only prepared a list of the documents and obtained signatures of Zahir Shah. These documents were received in response to the mutual legal assistance (MLA) application of the joint investigation team (JIT) on May 27, 2017.

Nawaz Sharif counsel Khawaja Haris inquired to the witness that the JIT in its MLA had required names, addresses and contact numbers of the real and beneficial owners of the London flats. If they had received this information. At this Dogar said that there was no mention of Nawaz Sharif, Hussain Nawaz, Hassan Nawaz, Maryam Nawaz and Captain (R) Muhammad Safdar in the documents. “But during investigation, it came to our knowledge that Nawaz Sharif is the benamidar owner of Neilsen and Nescoll and it also came to our knowledge that Maryam Nawaz is the beneficial owner. After I received these documents from Zahir Shah, NAB director investigation, Amjad Majeed Oulakh asked me to examine these documents and after approval of the competent authority place before the accountability court,” Dogar said. He further said that he did not knew if Oulakh was authorised by the NAB chairman for investigation of the Avenfield Apartments corruption reference. He admitted that NAB chairman did not authorize him in writing to file these documents before AC. Responding to a question, Dogar said that he had written in his investigation report that if any MLA response is being received, he would submit the response through a supplementary reference.

Further hearing will be today (Friday).