Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan speaking to journalists after a Supreme Court (SC) hearing on Monday raised questions about the timeline of ownership of the Sharif family's Mayfair properties.
"We won't do anything that may affect Supreme Court proceedings," the PTI chief claimed. "But today... They [the Sharif's] said they bought their Mayfair apartments in 2006 and didn't have them before that."
However, "Kulsoom Nawaz gave an interview in 2000 saying they got the apartments for their children's education," he claimed.
"Chaudhry Nisar said they got them in the '90s. Khawaja Asif said they got them in the '90s. Siddique Farooq said he went there in the '90s. They said they visited them. Did they go to some other apartment? They must all be wrong... Sheikh Rasheed went there before 2006 too. Maybe he was mistaken also," the PTI chief alleged.
"I am now embarrassed because in 1998, I protested outside their Mayfair apartments. If they weren't theirs, I don't know whose residence I protested outside. I would like to beg their pardon," he said. "If they weren't Nawaz Sharif's whose were they?"
The PTI chief also expressed his satisfaction with court proceedings.
"I am very happy that the SC decided they have to submit all documents by Tuesday... They [the government] said 'we are ready with all the evidence, we are ready for accountability and so is [Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's] family', but after seven months, they are still not ready and have asked for two more weeks to submit all their papers," he said.
"I am happy the SC doesn't want to drag on the case and wishes to conclude it quickly," he said.
"The SC asked four questions and said, 'If you can answer these questions there may not be need for any commission and the judge may decide the case in two hearings."
"For seven months, the PM didn't respond," he said. "They said we [the PTI] are doing the wrong thing, but it is his [the PM's] responsibility to either resign or present himself for accountability. There is no third option in democracy," the PTI chief claimed.
"They have kept the country hostage on this one issue for seven months," he said.
