ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Tuesday transferred two references against Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif from the accountability court of Judge Mohammad Bashir to another accountability court of Islamabad.

Following his conviction in the Avenfield properties reference, the former prime minister had filed appeals seeking the transfer of Al-Azizia Steel and Flagship Investment references against him from the court of Judge Bashir.

A two-judge IHC bench held that since the accountability judge himself had forwarded the matter for transfer of the pending references to the IHC administration and the defence counsel, too, had expressed apprehension that the same judge might discard the same evidence due to his predisposition, the appeals seeking transfer of references were accepted.

IHC to take up retired Captain Safdar’s plea seeking suspension of sentence today

The division bench comprising Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb announced the order after the additional deputy prosecutor general of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), Sardar Muzaffar Abbasi, and lead defence counsel Khawaja Haris Ahmed had concluded their arguments.

During the course of hearing, the bench asked multiple questions from the NAB’s prosecution team, which comprises two additional prosecutor generals and special prosecutors, while the defence counsel mentioned 12 common grounds in the three NAB references against Mr Sharif.

According to him, an agreement of 1980, the subsequent investment of AED12 million, the letters of Qatari Prince Hamad bin Jassim supporting the evidence of AED12 million investment, a worksheet relied upon by Sharif’s sons Hussain Nawaz and Hassan Nawaz to show the source of investment for acquiring assets/businesses and Hamad bin Jassim’s conduct had been commented upon adversely by the judge holding that the Qatari prince did not cooperate with the JIT.

The defence counsel said the issue of dependency was common in all the three references, while speeches of the Sharifs and findings about a Dubai-based company known as Capital FZE were bound to be repeated in the other references as well, as it formed JIT report’s Volume-VI pertaining to the matter of Al-Azizia Steel.

Cash-flow charts of assets and liabilities of the Sharifs prepared by the JIT was presumed to be correct in the accountability court’s judgement, while the defence stance on the admissibility of or the opinion given in the JIT report and the evidence given by one witness, Zahir Shah, were not accepted.

When the prosecutor argued that the defence counsel wanted reopening of the entire case, Justice Aurangzeb reminded him that the appellant wanted transfer of the references and not their retrial.

“They [defence counsel] accepted the trial proceeding as the accountability judge himself mentioned in an order that he would pass simultaneous decisions in all the three references. This was also observed by the IHC in a subsequent order,” Justice Aurangzeb remarked.

However, the accountability judge changed his stance and decided the Avenfield reference first and convicted the Sharifs in the said reference.

The NAB prosecutor said that there was no reason for the judge to give simultaneous decisions when the Sharifs had not produced anything in their defence.

Justice Farooq asked the NAB prosecutor even if the defence side had not produced any evidence in their defence, whether their stance was the same in all three references.

Mr Abbasi insisted that evidence in the three references was not identical and said NAB had filed the references on the directives of the Supreme Court as per its July 28, 2017, verdict.

The IHC bench observed that the SC had “referred the matter to NAB for investigation. It was up to NAB to decide whether the case could be filed against the accused or otherwise, and NAB was empowered not to file any reference if the case was not made out”.

Justice Aurangzeb snubbed NAB prosecutor Abbasi when he argued further and started reading out the minority judgement authored by Justice Asif Saeed Khosa in the Panama Papers case in order to establish the prosecution stance on the transfer pleas.

The bench expressed displeasure and remarked: “You are misleading this court as you are reading out the minority judgement. You are just wasting the court’s time.”

Justice Farooq reminded him that the majority judgement was authored by a three-member SC bench comprising Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan, Justice Azmat Saeed Sheikh and Justice Ijazul Ahsan and said if he wanted to add something from the majority judgement as well.

The prosecutor, however, said he had completed his arguments.

The bench then asked both — the prosecutor and the defence counsel — whether the IHC could transfer the case from one accountability court to another.

The defence counsel pointed out previous instances when the high court had transferred the cases from one judge to another, while the NAB’s prosecutor said the reference could be transferred only for cogent reasons.

Petitions for suspension of sentence

The same bench put off till Aug 13 the hearing on petitions seeking suspension of the sentences against Nawaz Sharif and Maryam Nawaz.

Judge Mohammad Bashir of the accountability court had awarded 10 years imprisonment to Nawaz Sharif and seven years imprisonment to his daughter Maryam Nawaz.

Since the accountability court had sentenced retired captain Mohammad Safdar to one year in prison, the IHC bench decided to take up his case on Wednesday (today). “He was sentenced for one year out of which he completed one month in prison and I don’t think his case be lingered on,” Justice Farooq observed.

The counsel for the son-in-law of former prime minister, Amjad Pervaiz, said that in such cases, the trial court could suspend the sentence.

The court directed the NAB prosecutor to assist the court in this matter and adjourned the hearing.

Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2018