ISLAMABAD: The Accountability Court of Islamabad could not proceed against ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif and members of his family on Tuesday in three corruption references filed against them by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on the order of the Supreme Court because all of them opted to boycott its proceedings.

Accountability Court Judge Mohammad Bashir had last week summoned Mr Sharif, his daughter Maryam, sons Hussain and Hassan and son-in-law retired Captain Mohammad Safdar to appear before the court on Tuesday in connection with the references.

A five-judge SC bench on July 28 directed NAB to file the references against Mr Sharif and his children within six weeks in the accountability court which had been asked to decide the references in six months. The apex court also appointed Justice Ijazul Ahsan as supervisory judge to monitor the trial court’s proceedings.

Mr Sharif and his children have publicly expressed concerns over the SC judgement in the Panama Papers case. They have filed review petitions before the same SC bench which took them up on Sept 12 and dismissed all of them on Sept 15.

Accountability court reissues summons for ousted PM and his children

NAB has filed three references against the Sharifs related to their London properties and establishment of 16 companies, including Flagship Investment Ltd in the United Kingdom and Al-Azizia and Hill Metal Establishment in Jeddah.

Neither the Sharif family’s members appeared before the accountability court on Tuesday, nor they have so far hired a lawyer to pursue the case.

However, Political Adviser to the Prime Minister Senator Asif Kirmani was present in the trial court on Tuesday to witness its proceedings.

When Judge Bashir asked Mr Kirmani to inform the accused about the summons for them, he said that he could only tell Mr Sharif, Ms Maryam and Mr Safdar because Hussain and Hassan Nawaz were settled aboard.

He informed the court that Mr Sharif was at present with his ailing wife in London.

When the case was taken up, NAB officials submitted a compliance report regarding summons earlier issued for members of the Sharif family, saying that a security officer at their residence had received the summons only for Mr Sharif, Ms Maryam and Mr Safdar from a representative of the bureau and told him that he had been instructed not to receive summons for Hussain and Hassan Nawaz.

The judge while expressing displeasure remarked that the court had issued summons for the accused and not for the security officer, adding that the NAB representative should not have just handed over the court orders to the security officer without recording and submitting his statement before the court.

“This is a criminal court. Not a civil court. If summons were handed over to a security official then his statement should also have been annexed with the report,” he remarked.

The court directed the NAB prosecution team to “trace the addresses of Hassan and Hussain” so that summons could be sent to them. At this moment, the NAB prosecutor requested the court to issue arrest warrants for the accused as they were “taking summons very easy” and the investigation officer might not have access to them.

“NAB has found out about London properties but is not aware about where do they [accused] live,” Judge Bashir remarked, saying that the address could be found out from the reference file.

The NAB prosecutor drew the court’s attention towards the Supreme Court’s directives for concluding the reference cases within six months.

“That order is for the court. We’ll look into it and also your performance during the period,” Judge Bashir replied.

The court while reissuing summons for the accused directed NAB to paste court orders [summons] outside their residence.

Mr Sharif and his sons have been named in all three references while Ms Maryam and Mr Safdar only in the Avenfield reference.

Further hearing on the references has been adjourned till next week.

Meanwhile, the accountability court would take up the reference against Finance Minister Ishaq Dar for possessing assets beyond known sources of income on Wednesday (today).

Also on Tuesday, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf appealed to the Supreme Court’s monitoring judge, Justice Ijazul Ahsan, to take notice of the absence of the Sharif family’s members in the accountability court. It called for a day-to-day hearing of the case.

Published in Dawn, September 20th, 2017