LAHORE: Hearing of the money laundering referenced against the family of Leader of Opposition in National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif was adjourned without any progress due to unavailability of the regular judge of an accountability court.

The jail officials brought Shehbaz and his son, Hamza, also leader of the opposition in Punjab Assembly, to the judicial complex for the hearings of two references – money laundering and Punjab Ashiana-i-Iqbal Housing Scheme.

Duty Judge Akmal Khan adjourned the money laundering reference till Feb 24.

Later, Shehbaz was produced before another accountability court for the housing scheme reference wherein statements of two prosecution witnesses were recorded.

Judge Amjad Nazir Chaudhry summoned more witnesses on Feb 25.

With the permission of the judge, Shehbaz being president of the PML-N, also signed tickets of his party’s candidates for the upcoming Senate election.

Other suspects in the reference, including former principal secretary to prime minister Fawad Hassan Fawad and the Lahore Development Authority’s former chairman, Ahad Khan Cheema, also attended the proceedings.

BAIL: A Lahore High Court two-judge bench on Wednesday adjourned hearing of a petition filed by Punjab Assembly opposition leader Hamza Shehbaz, seeking post-arrest bail in the money laundering and assets beyond means reference.

The petition’s hearing was fixed before the bench comprising Justice Sardar Sarfraz Dogar and Justice Asjad Javed Ghural.

Hamza’s counsel Azam Nazir Tarar and Amjad Pervez were present in the court. However, due to paucity of time the hearing was adjourned till Feb 23.

On the previous hearing, the NAB was directed to submit its reply to the petition.

The petition states that the allegations of money laundering and assets beyond means against the petitioner are false and frivolous as the petitioner has not been given the credit of income on account of a number of known sources of income duly declared by him from time to time.

Three co-suspects have already been allowed post-arrest bails in the reference.

Previously, the LHC had dismissed the first petition of Mr Hamza for the post-arrest bail on Feb 11, 2020. He later approached the SC for the bail, but was directed to move the LHC again as the grounds taken before the apex court were not discussed before the high court.

Published in Dawn, February 18th, 2021