ISLAMABAD: The Sup­reme Court office on Friday returned former president Asif Ali Zardari’s petition seeking transfer of four corruption references pending against him in the Islamabad accountability court to any such court in Karachi.

While returning the petition, the SC registrar office recalled that these references were filed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the Islamabad court in pursuance of an earlier court order of Jan 7, 2019 in the fake accounts case.

Then also Mr Zardari had challenged the court directives for NAB to file the references in the Islamabad court but his petition was dismissed by the Supreme Court on Feb 19, 2019 after the court directives were categorically and vehemently argued and contested by the lawyers of the two sides, the registrar office stated.

There was no provision of a second review as warranted under the provisions of Order 26, Rule 9 of the Supreme Court Rules 1980, it observed. Thus the present application was tantamount to second review and therefore it was returned for being not entertainable, the court office said.

The former president is facing four references at the Islamabad accountability court namely the fake bank accounts, Park Lane Estate Private Ltd, Thatta water supply and Toshakhana corruption references.

Already Mr Zardari had been indicted by the anti-graft court in the Toshakhana (gift repository) reference on Sept 9, on the charges of money laundering for creating benami properties through Park Lane Estate Pvt Ltd on Aug 10, in Thatta water supply reference on Oct 5 as well as in the fake bank accounts case.

Filed by senior lawyer Senator Farooq H. Naek, the petition had named NAB chairman Javed Iqbal, the presiding officer of Islamabad accountability court, former prime ministers Yousuf Raza Gilani and Nawaz Sharif, Abdul Ghani Majeed and former CEO of Summit Bank Hussain Lawai etc as respondents.

The petition had stated that throughout the course of recent history of the country, Mr Zardari had suffered on account of political victimisation and mudslinging by being implicated in many false and fabricated cases.

According to the petition, Mr Zardari had seen the rigours of jail in false and politically motivated cases for the accumulative period of about 11 years and had done so having faith in independence of judiciary and the justice system of Pakistan.

The former president had been acquitted in all the fabricated and concocted cases made against him in the past, the petition had stated.

It had said that that one of the present references had arisen out of inquiries conducted by the Federal Investigation Agency regarding fake/benami accounts connected with different individuals and entities.

Another inquiry was initiated on receipt of Suspicious Transaction Reports from the Financial Monitoring Unit (FMU) of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), the petition had said.

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2020