DHA City land scam: LHC dismisses Kayani’s plea against NAB actions

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Monday sustained Registrar’s Office objection and dismissed a petition by Kamran Kayani, brother of Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani (retd), a proclaimed offender in billions of rupees DHA-City land scam, challenging actions against him by the National Accountability Bureau. The office had objected that the power of attorney issued to his lawyer by the petitioner, who is in the United States, had not been attested by the Foreign Office of Pakistan. A two-judge bench comprising Justice Ali Baqar Najafi and Justice Tariq Saleem Sheikh took up the petition as “objection case”.

Advocate Nadeem Kausar, the counsel of Kayani, argued that the law allowed a person to get a power of attorney attested from notary public in a country of current residence or the foreign office of native country. He also referred to a 2007 decision by a division bench of the LHC in support of his arguments and said attestation from the foreign office was not necessary. The bench asked the counsel didn’t he thinks the petitioner should have surrendered before the law first, since he was an absconder for the last five years.

However, the counsel said he would address this point of law at later stage once the bench decided on the office objection. After hearing the counsel, the bench reserved its decision and announced the same after a while to sustain the office objection and dismissed the petition. Kamran Kayani in fact filed two separate petitions against the NAB for implicating him in two references –DHA-City and Ashiana-i-Iqbal Housing Scheme. An accountability court had declared him proclaimed offender in 2016 while the NAB had been clueless about his whereabouts. Two other suspects in the DHA-City scam - Hammad Arshad and Brig Khalid Nazir Butt (retd) - have already been indicted.