Money-laundering, assets case: Shahbaz’s son, daughter, son-in-law, three others declared POs

LAHORE: An accountability court on Thursday declared Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) President Shahbaz Sharif’s son Suleman Shahbaz, daughter Rabia Imran and son-in-law Ali Imran Yousaf as proclaimed offenders (POs) in a money-laundering and assets beyond means reference against the family.

The court had started proceedings for declaring the Shahbaz family members absconders after they did not join the case investigation and trial proceedings against them. The court also declared three other accused as POs in the same case, including Haroon Yousaf, Tahir Naqvi and Ali Ahmad Khan.

The court was also all set to declare Shahbaz’s wife Nusrat Shahbaz a proclaimed offender in the case. However, it deferred the process after the counsel for Nusrat Shahbaz argued that time period for declaring his client a proclaimed offender had not been completed yet.

Shahbaz’s son-in-law Ali Imran Yousaf had already been declared a proclaimed offender by an accountability court in 2018. NAB had accused Ali Imran of receiving graft in excess of Rs12 million from Ikram Naveed, former chief executive officer (CEO) of the Punjab Power Development Company (PPDC). Before that in October 2019, Suleman Shahbaz was declared as an absconder by Accountability Court Judge Ameer Mohammad Khan in money laundering investigation on the request of National Accountability Bureau.

PML-N President Shahbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shahbaz were produced before the court on Thursday after expiry of their judicial remand. The court also recorded statements of prosecution witnesses including Assistant Directors of Election Commission Khalid Mehmood and Sayed Tayyeb Zawar. Deputy Secretary Provincial Assembly Faisal Bilal also recoded his statement before the court.

The court, after recording statements of the prosecution witnesses, adjourned the hearing till Dec 3. In the reference against the Shahbaz family, the National Accountability Bureau had claimed that in the last 30 years, the family assets swelled from Rs2 million to Rs7,000 million, that the family failed to justify.

NAB alleged that Shahbaz Sharif, in connivance with his co-accused family members, Benamidars, front men, close associates, employees and moneychangers, developed an organised system of money-laundering for accumulation of assets disproportionate to his known sources of income to the tune of Rs7,328 million.

NAB had nominated former chief minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif, his wife Nusrat Shahbaz, sons Hamza Shahbaz, Suleman Shahbaz, daughters -- Rabia Imran and Javeria Ali -- in the reference.

The other nominated accused were: Nisar Ahmad, Syed Muhammad Tahir Naqvi, Ali Muhammad Khan, Qasim Qayyum, Rashid Karamat, Masroor Anwer, Muhammad Usman, Fazal Dad Abbasi, Muhammad Shoaib Qamar and Haroon Yousaf Aziz.

According to NAB, the Shahbaz family members received foreign funds through alleged fake transactions. Hamza Shahbaz received $2.985 million through 23 transactions, Shahbaz’s wife Nusrat Shahbaz $1.921 million, daughters Rabia Imran $740,000 and Javeria Ali $283,000. These transactions had been made through the company, owned by Shahbaz Sharif’s son-in-law Haroon Yousaf. The maximum numbers of fake transactions to the Shahbaz family had been made through Al-Zarooni Exchange of Dubai.

NAB had also accepted requests from four people -- Muhammad Mushtaq, alias Mushtaq Cheeni, his son Yasir Mushtaq, Shahid Rafique and Aftab Ahmad -- of becoming approvers against the Shahbaz family in the reference. It was learnt that the reference consisted of 25,000 pages and 55 volumes.

In June 2019, Muhammad Mushtaq, alias Cheeni and his son Yasir Mushtaq, front men of the Shahbaz family, while recording their statements before the court had confessed to facilitating Suleman Shahbaz in whitening his Rs600 million black money through fake loan agreements and engineered telegraphic transfers (TTs).