• Punjab ACE official says Islamabad police not cooperating over minister’s arrest
• Capital police seek ‘relevant documents’ to execute warrant

ISLAMABAD / LAHORE: A special judicial magistrate of Rawalpindi on Saturday issued a non-bailable arrest warrant for Federal Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah in an inquiry related to purchase of plots in a housing society at a “throwaway price”.

Meanwhile addressing a press conference in Lahore, Adviser to Punjab Chief Minister for Anti-Corruption retired Brigadier Musaddiq Abbasi said that Mr Sanaullah had taken two plots as “bribe” from an “illegal housing society” — the Bismillah Housing Scheme — in Chakwal district.

The developments are being linked to the intimidating statements of the interior minister against the PTI long marchers and recent raids of the interior ministry’s subordinate agency — the Federal Investigation Agency — on the residences of PTI leaders as well as those running the party’s fundraising website.

Special judicial magistrate of Rawalpindi Ghulam Akbar issued a non-bailable arrest warrant for Mr Sanaullah on the request of the Punjab Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE).

The ACE had obtained the minister’s warrant since he allegedly failed to comply with the repeated summons in case number 19/20 registered with the anti-graft body.

Akhlaq Ahmed, the owner of the society, has also been booked for bribing Mr Sanaullah with a plot to get his society registered, claimed the prosecution.

Speaking at the presser, Mr Abbasi said the ACE had initiated an inquiry against Mr Sanaullah (in 2017), who was then the Punjab law minister.

“During the investigation, it has been revealed that in the opening ceremony of Bismillah Housing Society, Colony Kallar Kahar, Rana Sanaullah, who was provincial law minister at that time, participated along with his wife. The housing society’s owner gifted Mr Sanaullah two plots measuring 10 kanals as a bribe,” the adviser said and added the plots in question were transferred to Mr Sanaullah by the society at a much lower than scheduled rate.

He further said during the investigation it was also revealed that the record of Plot No. 18A and 139A was missing. “The plot numbers 18A and 139A in registry number 171/1 and 172/1 dated December 12, 2017 fall under the category of creating bogus and fake documents, which is a crime. Sanaullah paid the price of both plots at Rs900,000 which is very less than the scheduled rate thus causing damage to the national treasury,” he said.

Musaddiq Abbasi said these two plots were still in the possession of Rana Sanaullah and his wife, which itself was “proof” that he had got these as a bribe by using his official position.

He said the case was registered in 2019 but Sanaullah did not appear before ACE. “Sanaullah was re-summoned on Oct 6 but he did not appear before the ACE after which non-bailable arrest warrants were issued against him,” he said.

The retired brigadier said the ACE was taking indiscriminate action against the corrupt elements and no one was above the law.

Sana’s reaction

Interior Minister Sanaullah appearing on a TV talk show criticised ACE over securing his arrest warrant.

He questioned why his arrest warrant was secured at this juncture, whereas the case was registered against him some years ago, and why ACE remained quiet during this period while the province [Punjab] was being ruled by the PTI.

He also tried to differentiate the ACE’s proceeding with the FIA’s ongoing raids on PTI’s leaders saying that the FIA could have started arresting PTI leaders three-four months back but it proceeded against them after the foreign funding inquiry was completed by the Election Commission of Pakistan.

PTI, on its official Twitter account, had said that a police party had departed to arrest Sanaullah and would reach the Kohsar police station soon. The process to arrest Rana Sanaullah will be initiated by informing the local police as per rules.

The Islamabad police on the other hand tweeted: “ACE will be requested to provide relevant documents to execute the warrant.”

An official of the ACE Punjab visited the Police Station Secretariat of Islamabad. While interacting with media he claimed that the Islamabad police did not cooperate with the ACE to arrest Rana Sanaullah.

Meanwhile, Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb said warrants for Rana Sanaullah’s arrest were issued in Lahore as Imran Khan is afraid of him, APP reported.

In a tweet, she said it was a conspiracy to spread chaos and anarchy in the country in order to divert attention from the corruption of “foreign agent, liar”, who was playing with national security and trying to hoodwink the people.

The minister said that on the orders of Imran Khan, preparations were being made to “invade the federation”.

Published in Dawn, October 9th, 2022