ISLAMABAD: The National Accoun­t­ability Bureau (NAB) on Thursday was granted access to Volume 10 of the voluminous investigation report against former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his family, submitted by the six-man Joint Investigation Team (JIT) in the Panama Papers case.

The Supreme Court provided four copies of the volume, which contains details of the requests for mutual legal assistance (MLA) sent by the JIT to departments in various countries.

The copies were provided in response to a NAB request for certified copies of all 10 volumes, which were required for the preparation of corruption references against the former prime minister and members of this family, including Finance Minister Ishaq Dar.

Bureau official says paperwork required for references against Sharif family complete

“Yes, we have received Volume 10 in a sealed envelope that was directly handed over to the investigation wing of the bureau,” a senior NAB officer told Dawn on condition of anonymity.

With this, all the documentation required to file the court-mandated references had been completed, the official said, adding that the references would soon be filed before the accountability courts concerned.

Although the rest of the report had been handed over to the bureau, Volume 10 had not been made public by the Supreme Court at the request of JIT head Wajid Zia, since it also contained details of MLA requests that were still pending.

Earlier, a three-judge implementation bench of the Supreme Court, headed by Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan, had merely allowed Khawaja Haris Ahmed, who represented then prime minister Nawaz Sharif, to go through two pages of this volume.

According to the summary of the JIT report, the MLA requests were initiated by the JIT chairman under Section 21 of the National Accountability Ordinance 1999.

The requests were sent to the attorney general of the British Virgin Islands, the UK Central Authority, the Saudi Interior Ministry, UAE’s Ministry of Justice, the Central Authority of Switzerland and the prosecutor general of Luxemburg.

NAB approached the apex court after the court office earlier declined a similar request. On Aug 11, NAB again approached the court to provide three more certified copies of the complete report, containing all 10 volumes.

The application was put up after the court office provided only one verified copy of the JIT report to the bureau, and also withheld volume 10.

When it disqualified Nawaz Sharif under Article 62(1)(f) of the Constitution, a five-judge Supreme Court bench had directed NAB to file four references before the Rawalpindi accountability court within six weeks of the verdict, on the basis of material collected by the JIT, as well as material already available with the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and NAB.

The court had ordered references against former prime minister Nawaz Sharif; his children Maryam, Hussain and Hassan Nawaz; son-in-law retired Capt Mohammad Safdar in relation to the four controversial London flats.

Another reference was to be filed against Mr Sharif and his sons for the Azizia Steel Company and Hill Metal Establishment, while a separate reference would be filed against the trio regarding 16 other companies.

A fourth reference is to be filed against Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, for possessing assets beyond his known sources of income.

The Supreme Court has nominated one of its judges, Justice Ijaz-ul-Ahsan, to monitor and supervise NAB’s working and oversee proceedings in the accountability court.

Published in Dawn, August 18th, 2017