LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Wednesday was surprised to learn that the official who cancelled the first contract of Ashiana-i-Iqbal Housing Scheme was a prosecution witness of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) against former chief minister Shahbaz Sharif, former secretary to chief minister Fawad Hassan Fawad and others.

“You have made the responsible officer your witness on the pretext of that he signed the letter under duress,” a division bench asked the NAB prosecutor hearing bail petitions moved by Mr Sharif and Mr Fawad.

During the course of hearing, the bench comprising Justice Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan and Justice Mirza Viqas Rauf repeatedly asked the NAB prosecutor to produce any document/letter showing involvement of Fawad being secretary implementation to the CM in cancellation of the contract initially awarded to Latif & Sons.

LHC surprised to learn that the official who cancelled first contract of Ashiana was NAB witness against Shahbaz

Prosecutor Faisal Bokhari admitted that there was no such document, however, he said the bureau had statements of co-suspects against Mr Fawad establishing his role in the cancellation of the contract. He alleged that Fawad wanted to get the contract awarded to company of Kamran Kiyani, brother of former army chief Ashfaq Parvez Kiyani. He said the investigators traced banking transaction of over Rs50 million made to the account of Fawad’s brother through the account of Kiyani’s company. The amount was paid as bribe, the prosecutor added.

Advocate Azam Nazir Tarar, the counsel for Fawad, stated at this point that the transaction in question was in relation with the family business of his client, which also followed another transaction of over Rs80 million from the account of Fawad’s brother to Kiyani’s account.

Being dissatisfied with the NAB’s view, Justice Khan observed that the NAB could make a case of assets beyond means out of that bank transaction but could not relate it to the allegation of misuse of power.

Advocate Tarar argued that Fawad had no powers to exercise and his nature of job was like a post office. A secretary (implementation) was supposed to forward summaries to the chief minister and convey decisions on them to departments concerned, he explained.

The bench also observed that documents available with the NAB did not show that the contract of the housing scheme was cancelled unilaterally rather there was a civil litigation and the company had been compensated by the government.

The prosecutor pointed out that Rs5.9 million had been paid to Latif & Sons as compensation against cancellation of the lawful contract, which caused a loss to public money.

To a court’s query, the prosecutor stated that then CEO of Punjab Land Development Company (PLDC) Tahir Khurshid, also the project director, had cancelled the contract following an approval by the company’s board of directors.

The bench expressed its wonder when the prosecutor said Khurshid was a witness of the NAB as he approved the cancellation under duress.

Justice Rauf regretted that the bench was not being properly assisted by the NAB as several queries of the bench remained unanswered.

Opposing the bail petition of Mr Sharif, NAB Special Prosecutor Akram Qureshi mainly argued that the former chief minister unlawfully encroached upon the jurisdiction of the PLDC and cancelled the contract. He said the PLDC was an autonomous body and the chief minister had no authority to intervene in its affairs.

To a court’s query about alleged involvement of Paragon City in the case, he said the contract was later awarded on an inflated price of Rs13 billion to M/s Lahore Casa Developers, which was a front company of the Paragon. The special prosecutor also sought more time to submit documents in support of his arguments.

The bench adjourned further hearing till Feb 11 and directed the NAB to also come with total expenses incurred upon all projects of the Ashiana-i-Iqbal Housing Scheme in the province and subsidy given by the government on it.

Published in Dawn, February 7th, 2019