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ISLAMABAD, Sept 12: Asif Ali Zardari was convicted on Thursday night in Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) reference, requiring him to undergo seven years rigorous imprisonment and payment of Rs40 million as fine.
Accountability Court Judge Syed Mumtaz Hussain Shah handed down the conviction in the reference in which the prosecution had accused Asif of receiving kickbacks amounting to Rs31.2 million.
Asif has also been disqualified for five years from holding a public office or applying to monetary facility from any financial institutions. In case of default of payment of fine, Asif Zardari, the husband of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, has to undergo another term of one year.
It is the first conviction of Asif, who is behind the bars since November 1996. His last conviction along with Benazir in the SGS case was overturned by the Supreme Court by sending back the case to the accountability court for retrial. The steel mills reference was filed during the Nawaz Sharif period while Ehtesab Bench of the Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, had framed charges against him on June 24, 1998.
There are a total of 13 cases against Asif. Seven pertain to his alleged corruption and six others are criminal ones, including four murder cases. He has been granted bail by courts in 11 cases, so far.
ASIF REACTS: Soon after the judgment, which was announced at 9pm, Asif denounced the decision and vowed to challenge the conviction before the superior courts. He also questioned as to what was the urgency to announce the sentence late at night.
“By convicting me, they want to pressurize and demoralize the PPP workers,” he observed while talking to reporters, and expressed the confidence that the decision would further mobilize the party workers to participate in the electoral process with full zeal and zest.
He also asked as to what purpose would be served by awarding him the maximum punishment of seven years.
He stressed that the case was so weak that he could not have even be indicted.
Heavy contingent of police was deployed around the Rawalpindi Accountability Court throughout the day and night and no person was allowed to enter the premises without a prior permission. Throughout the day, Asif’s friends and workers of the PPP kept on guessing about the judgment or chatting with him.
Later, a spokesman for the PPP alleged that ailing Asif Zardari, the defence lawyers, journalists and Asif’s friends were made to pass through an agonizing wait as the verdict delivery was postponed hour-by-hour then minute-by-minute.
