ISLAMABAD, Nov 8: Jailed PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari on Friday asked an accountability court to transfer the SGS preshipment inspection case against him to some other court.

Through an application, the accused stated that the manner in which the case was being proceeded had dwindled his trust and he did not expect justice to be delivered to him.

Filed by Farooq Naek advocate, the application stated that the conviction of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto by the court reflected that the court allegedly had made up its mind against him and his wife, therefore the accused had no trust on the court.

The accountability court had recently convicted Benazir Bhutto to three years rigorous imprisonment under section 31A of the National Accountability Bureau Ordinance in the SGS case.

The defence stated that the proceedings of the case manifest bias.

However, the accountability judge, Mansoor Ali Khan, observed that he had no authority to transfer the case. The judge asked the defence to approach the superior judiciary if it wanted to get the case transferred from his court. The judge then adjourned the case for November 21.

Earlier, the defence counsel had also filed another application before the court to establish that Mr Zardari had already served his sentence in the SGS case, and therefore it could not proceed the accused in the same case. He further stated that the Constitution guaranteed that no person could be prosecuted twice under the same offence.

The prosecution was holding both Benazir Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari responsible for awarding the preshipment inspection contract to SGS in consideration of the six per cent commission of the total amount received by the company from the government of Pakistan. The commission was paid to the offshore company, Bomer Finance Inc. allegedly owned by Mr Zardari while Jens Schlegelmilch acted as his fiduciary agent. The ultimate beneficiaries of these commissions were Asif Zardari and Benazir Bhutto, the reference said.