LAHORE: With different conspiracy theories doing the rounds about the Sharifs recent sojourn to Saudi Arab, a close aide of the PML-N leaders says the brothers visited Riyadh to seek financial assistance for the country as well as bridging differences among some Muslim states on certain issues.

Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif had left for Saudi Arab by a plane sent by the ruling family of the Gulf kingdom on Dec 27 and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif had joined the younger Sharif there three days later. According to PML-N rivals, the two brothers were there to seek a guarantor for striking a deal like the Musharraf-era National Reconciliation Ordinance to get rid of the corruption cases being heard by accountability courts here.

“The two brothers during their meetings with Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman and other influential members of the royal family lobbied for seeking a financial package for Islamabad,” the source said on the condition of anonymity.

He claimed that the lobbying bore fruit as a delegation of the finance ministry would soon visit Riyadh to finalize the financial assistance package. The aid package would probably be in the form of oil supplies on deferred payments, he added.

The Gulf kingdom had earlier given Pakistan $1.5 billion when Nawaz Sharif came to power in 2013.

The source also claimed that the former prime minister played a “very positive” role in bringing closer some Muslim brotherly states which had divergent views on Syria, Al-Quds and other issues facing the Ummah.

Leadership of these states had approached the elder Sharif for using his `influence’ he had earned after nuclear tests in 1998, for settling down the differences before it’s too late, he said, without naming the states which had contacted the ousted premier.

Rejecting as rubbish the reports that the Sharifs had been “summoned to investigate” their relations with some Saudi influential figures facing corruption charges there, he said Nawaz Sharif enjoyed so much respect with the Saudi ruling family that a portion of the Masjid-i-Nabvi in Medinah had been got vacated as a special protocol when the PML-N chief went there to offer Nawafil.

Published in Dawn, January 5th, 2018