Chaudhry Sugar Mills case: Maryam held during jail visit to meet her father

LAHORE: The National Accountability Bureau on Thursday arrested Pakistan Muslim League-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz in an ongoing investigation related to alleged money laundering for purchasing shares in the Chaudhry Sugar Mills.

A NAB team arrested the daughter of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif around 1:15pm from inside the Kot Lakhpat jail where she had gone to meet her incarcerated father.

Sources said Maryam was with her father when a NAB team arrived at Kot Lakhpat Jail. She was informed about the NAB team after which she was asked to report in the office of jail superintendent. In the office, the NAB team handed her over the arrest warrants and informed her that she was under custody in Chaudhry Sugar Mills money laundering investigation.

NAB on Thursday also arrested co-accused in the case, Yusuf Abbas Sharif, son of the late Abbas Sharif, a brother of Nawaz and Shahbaz.

Maryam was supposed to appear before the Combined Investigation Team (CIT) of NAB at 3pm. However, she submitted a one-page written reply to the NAB authorities through her representative and went to see her father in jail.

Maryam’s statement submitted to NAB reads: “Please ‘appreciate’ that I entered appearance on 31-07-2019 in compliance with call-up notice dated 23-07-2010 and furnished whatever information was within my personal knowledge. However, the above cited call-up notice does not acknowledge the same.

“Please appreciate that on the said date I had requested for reasonable time to submit comprehensive and accurate reply as the same is to be prepared in consultation with the record which is not readily with me because I am not share-holder since the year 2016.

“I reiterate my request for reasonable time to trace the requisite record and assure to extend full cooperation to facilitate the captioned inquiry without prejudice to all my legal rights.”

It had been learnt that after seeing an unsatisfactory response from Maryam regarding the call-up notice and the questioner, earlier handed over to her, NAB Lahore decided to arrest Maryam after consultation the NAB Headquarters Islamabad.

Sources said Maryam had an apprehension that she could be arrested, and that was why she avoided appearing before the CIT and preferred submitting a lame reply through her representative.

At the same time, political sources claim that the arrest of Maryam was already decided by NAB. She could have been arrested in any case, they said.

This reporter learnt from the NAB sources that a team also raided different places of Shahbaz family on Thursday in a bid to arrest one Abdul Aziz, another cousin of Maryam Nawaz, and a brother of Yusuf Abbas in the same investigation. However, he is still at large. Last week, Yousaf and Abdul Aziz were offloaded at Lahore airport when they were trying to flee the country in the guise of pilgrims.

After the arrest, Maryam Nawaz was shifted to NAB Lahore office. She has been placed in a day-care centre situated in the office after declaring it a sub-jail. Women police officials have been deployed for the security of Maryam Nawaz.

NAB officials will produce Maryam and her cousin Yousaf before an accountability court on Friday (today) for obtaining their physical remand.

Thursday was a tough day for the Sharif family, as after Mushtaq Cheeni, two more accused in the money-laundering investigation against Shahbaz Sharif and his sons Suleman Shahbaz and Hamza Shahbaz decided to become approver against Shahbaz family.

The News has learnt through documents available with it that Shahid Rafique and Aftab Mehmood, who were arrested by NAB on April 20 in investigation against Shahbaz family, had decided to become approvers. Both have submitted an application to NAB chairman for becoming approvers. In this regard, NAB had obtained transitory remand of both to produce them before the NAB chairman.

Shahid Rafique, the owner of Zarco Money Exchange, had confessed that he provide a channel to Shahbaz family for whitening their black money.

On June 17, one Mushtaq alias Cheeni, and his son Yasir Mushtaq, alleged front men for Shahbaz family, in their confessional statement before the court, had stated that they facilitated Suleman Shahbaz, son of PML-N President Shahbaz Sharif, in turning his Rs600 million black money into white through fake loan agreements and engineered telegraphic transfers (TTs).

As per details of Chaudhry Sugar Mills money laundering investigation, NAB in January 2018 received a Financial Monitoring Unit (FMU) report describing huge suspicious transactions in billions of rupees under the Anti-Money Laundering Act. In January 2018, the PML-N was ruling the country. After receiving the FMU report, NAB started an inquiry in Oct 2018, and found that Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz, Shahbaz Sharif and family, Abbas Sharif and family were shareholders in the company, along with some foreigners from the UAE and the UK.

During probe, it was revealed that huge investments were made in Chaudhry Sugar Mills from 2001 to 2017 in billions of rupees in the name of issuing shares for foreigners. Interestingly, later on same shares of the company were transferred back to Maryam, Hussain and Nawaz Sharif at various occasions without paying any money to the said foreign business partners.

Maryam Nawaz, in her previous hearing before the NAB CIT, failed to establish her business links with foreign nationals including Saeed Saif Bin Jabar Al-Suweidi, a UAE national, Sheikh Zakauddin, a UK national, Hani Ahmad Jamjoom, a Saudi national, and Naseer Abdullah Lootah, a UAE national, after which she was summoned again for Aug 8. On her avoiding appearance before the NAB team, she was arrested on Thursday.

NAB sources said that investigators had come to a conclusion that names of foreigners were used as proxies to make huge investments in the company for the reason that the Sharif family did not have white money for investment. They alleged that Chaudhry Sugar Mills investigation was a classic case of money laundering.

Moreover, NAB is investigating all members of the Shahbaz family for alleged money-laundering and having assets beyond known sources of means. NAB had summoned Hassan and Hussain, but both did not appear as both are absconders in the Avenfield case and are living in London. Suleman Shahbaz is also an absconder in Ramzan Sugar Mills and money-laundering investigation case and is living with his cousins in London.

Meanwhile, an accountability court extended 12-day judicial remand of PML-N leaders -- Khwaja Saad Rafique and Salman Rafique -- in Paragon housing scam.

The court was likely to frame charges against the Khwaja brothers, but could not do so on Thursday as Saad Rafique did not appear in the court because of his participation in the National Assembly session.

The absences of Saad Rafique disappointed the court and the judge remarked that the trial of the case should also be completed in National Assembly if the accused could not appear before the court.