ISLAMABAD / LAHORE: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has booked former prime minister Imran Khan and other Pak­is­tan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) leaders for their involvement in connection with the prohibited funding case against the party, for submitting false affidavits to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

In an FIR registered earlier this month by the Com­merical Bank Circle in Islam­abad, the investigation age­ncy stated, “[The] PTI submitted an affidavit of [Abraaj founder] Arif Mas­ood Naqvi before the Elec­tion Commi­ssion of Pakistan stating the­rein that all the amounts collected in the accounts of WCL (Wootton Cricket Lim­ited) were submitted into PTI’s account in Pakistan…[the] affidavit has been proved to be false/forged as two more transactions were also made from WCL to two different acco­unts in Pakistan in May 2013.”

The FIR also mentioned United Bank Limited (UBL) for its failure to report suspicious transactions to the auth­orities concerned.

“Cha­u­dhary Shahid Bashir, the operation manager of UBL’s Jinnah Avenue branch in Islamabad, facilitated these suspicious/illegal transactions by not reporting the aforesaid illegalities to the concerned authorities and also allowed Internet Merchant Acqui­ring Agreement changing the title of the account to Naya Pakistan…” it added.

The FIR lodged in Islamabad included sections 420, 468, 471, 477-A, and 109 read with section 5 and 23 of the Foreign Exchange Regu­la­tion Act 1947. According to the FIR, the Abraaj owner transferred $2,121,500 of his ‘ill-gotten’ money to a PTI account in the UBL. The signatories of the UBL account included Imran Khan, Saifullah Nyazee among other PTI leaders.

Two PTI leaders get bail; another tells FIA he has nothing to do with party transactions

On Oct 5, two FIRs were registered by FIA in Lahore and Karachi. Both of them shared the same charges — sections 420 and 109 being common to all the FIRs — against the PTI leadership.

The FIR in Lahore accused Mr Naqvi, Mr Shafi, Mr Zaman, Manzoor Ahmed Cha­udhry, Mubashir Ahmed, the management of Habib Bank Limited, and the PTI leadership of fraud. While the FIR registered in Karachi pointed out that Mr Naqvi was the major beneficiary of foreign funding and he received Foreign Tele­gra­phic Transfers (FTTs) from Abraaj Investment Manage­ment Limited, Aman Foun­dation, Gray Mackenzie Hol­d­ing, Silver Line Holdings, and Strelizia ATF Aman.

PTI member distances himself from bank accounts

Meanwhile, a member of the PTI’s central finance board, Yunus Ali Raza, in a written reply to the FIA, distanced himself from the party’s financial affairs. He said his involvement was only limited to being a counter-signatory of certain bank accounts of the PTI, the details of which were never shared with him.

Regarding the receipt of $2.1 million from the Wootton Cricket Limited into the PTI’s accounts or Rs 56,292,500 transferred from Tariq Shafi’s personal account to the PTI account from the $575,000 sent by the Wootton Club, Mr Yunus stated he had no knowledge of these transactions.

Regarding the transfer of Rs36,000,000 and Rs25,000,000 to two communication companies from the Insaf Trust account to fund PTI’s media campaign, he again responded that Finance Secretary Sardar Azhar Tariq Khan and other key individuals namely, Aamir Mehmood Kiani and Saifullah Nyazee would be best placed to respond. He gave the same answer to a question about the concealment of bank accounts, claiming he “has not participated in any meeting of the PTI Finance Board.”

PTI leaders get bail

Separately, a sessions court in Lahore on Tuesday granted interim pre-arrest bail to provincial ministers Mian Mehmoodur Rasheed and Murad Raas in a case of ‘prohibited’ funding registered by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) against the PTI. Both ministers appeared before the court along with their legal counsel and sought pre-arrest bail.

The court allowed the bail petitions of the PTI leaders subject to the furnishing of surety bonds of Rs50,000 each and restrained the FIA from arresting them till Oct 31.

Earlier, the ministers’ counsel contended that the FIA unlawfully took cognisance of the matter relating to the prohibited funding and fake accounts after the ECP issued its decision.

Wajih Ahmad Sheikh in Lahore also contributed to this report

Published in Dawn, October 12th, 2022