KARACHI: An anti-corruption court on Thursday issued arrest warrants of former prime minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, former commerce minister Makhdoom Amin Fahim and others in a multi-billion trade subsidy scam.

The non-bailable arrest warrants of the PPP stalwarts were issued after the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) named them, along with seven others, as absconding accused in the final investigation report submitted in the court earlier in the day.

The judge of Special Federal Anti-Corruption Court-I, Mohammad Azeem, accepted the final charge-sheet for hearing and issued warrants of absconders with a directive to FIA to arrest them and produce before the court on June 17.

Mr Gilani and Mr Fahim, along with former and serving officials of the Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP), have been booked for their alleged involvement in approval and disbursement of fraudulent trade subsidies.

According to the final investigation report, the ministry of commerce had announced 25 per cent freight subsides under the trade policy for 2002-03 to promote export of non-traditional items which brought less than $5 million annually.

The FIA report claimed that Faisal Siddique Khan and M. Firdous had visited the Prime Minister’s House to give Rs5 million to the former prime minister for allegedly directing the chief executive of TDAP to approve subsidy claims filed by Faisal Siddique. It said Mohammad Zubair, deputy secretary (personal) to the PM secretariat, had received the money.

The major share of funds disbursed to various firms went into the hands of Faisal Siddique through his front men Mian Tariq, Mehr Haroon Rasheed and others, it added.

The report said on the directives of former minister for commerce Amin Fahim, Farhan Junjeo, an officer (BPS-18) under suspension and facing departmental inquiry, was requisitioned from the Sindh government and inducted into the ministry in August, 2009, regardless of the fact that his case was pending. Farhan Junjeo was made director in the commerce minister’s office and he issued directives in subsidy cases, it added.

He worked in the commerce ministry without salary since the accountant general of Sindh had not issued last pay certificate over his unauthorised absence, thus his appointment was against the law, the report said.

Besides the two PPP leaders, Mohammad Zubair, Farhan Junejo, Faisal Siddique, Mehr Haroon Rasheed, Anisul Hasnain, Mian Tariq and Imran Sabir have been shown absconders in the report.

Among the names in the charge-sheet were those of the TDAP’s former chairman Tariq Iqbal Puri and its two director generals.

Dozens of connected cases about trade subsidy scam against TDAP officials and private persons are pending before the court.

Our Lahore Bureau adds: Yousuf Raza Gilani said on Thursday he would appear in the accountability court in Islamabad on June 4 and the ATC in Karachi in the TDAP case.

Talking to Dawn, he claimed he had been implicated in different cases by the government on political grounds. “Bring out all the cases against me and my sons in order to avoid the implications of a double jeopardy,” he called upon the interior ministry.

The former prime minister said he was the only politician who received notices and appeared in courts.

He said if the competent appointing authority was to be held responsible no one could be spared. He lamented that no case in the country was completed without implicating him whether it was the case of Ogra, NICL, NRO, TDAP or the Haj scam.

Published in Dawn, May 30th, 2014