PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Wednesday extended the interim pre-arrest bail to Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz leader retired Captain Mohammad Safdar on an ongoing inquiry against him by the National Accountability Bureau, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, regarding his assets.

A bench consisting of Justice Roohul Amin Khan and Justice Syed Mohammad Attique Shah ordered the extension of the pre-arrest bail, which was granted by the court on Oct 15, as the petitioner showed up due to the absence of his lawyers over a strike of the legal fraternity against changes to the Code of Civil Procedure.

During previous hearing, the court had directed the petitioner to produce two surety bonds of Rs500,000 each.

Senior NAB prosecutor Azeem Dad requested the bench to adjourn the case for a short period of time.

The bench observed that the next date would be fixed later keeping in view of the lawyers’ strike.

The petitioner, who is son-in-law of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, has said the inquiry/investigation against him was based on mala fide intent as he had appeared before the combined investigation team (CIT) of the NAB on multiple occasions.

PML-N leader calls for changes to NAB law to prevent its use for political purposes

He said he had provided all information which the investigation officers had sought but still his arrest warrants were issued by the NAB chairman.

Mr Safdar said he had appeared before the investigation team on different occasions and lastly a call-up notice was issued to him on Sept 17, 2020, which was accompanied by a questionnaire to which he provided a detailed reply.

He said on his visit to the NAB office in Peshawar on Oct 8 in compliance with a call-up notice, he had been provided with a notice regarding issuance of his warrants of arrest.

The petitioner, who is a former MNA, feared that he would be arrested and humiliated by the NAB.

The NAB’s executive board had early in 2018 given approval for the start of probe into a complaint sent in by a citizen accusing Mr Safdar of possessing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income, which is a crime under the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO), 1999.

Meanwhile, Mr Safdar told reporters that the opposition’s Pakistan Democratic Movement would stage a historical public meeting in Peshawar on Nov 22, which would lead to the ouster of the selected PTI government.

He said the opposition parties would make the gathering a success though the government issued all terror alerts to them.

“Wherever the PTM decides to hold a public meeting, the government tells it about terrorist threats in that particular city. Instead of trying to scare the PMD through threat alerts, the government should give reply to the questions raised by it,” he said.

Mr Safdar said the time had come to make changes to the NAB law as currently, the bureau had been used for political purposes. He said the bureau spent millions of rupees on a single case without noteworthy progress.

Published in Dawn, November 5th, 2020