Court reserves verdict on Sharif’s plea to merge three references
islamabad — An Accountability Court here on Tuesday reserved its judgment in a plea of Sharif family seeking to club three references against them for hearing together and was likely to announce the same on Wednesday.
Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, his daughter Maryam Nawaz and son-in-law Capt. (retd) Mohammed Safdar appeared before the court together amid foolproof security arrangements made by the law enforcement agencies.
A number of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N)’s leaders and activists were present on the occasion who chanted slogans in favour of their leadership.
Judge Mohammed Bashir took up the Sharif’s plea for hearing seeking to club three references related to Avenfield property, Flagship Investment and Azizia Steel Mills for hearing together in light of Islamabad High Court (IHC) judgment to rehear the case.
As the hearing began, the counsel for the Sharif family Khawaja Haris contended before the court that the charges levelled against the Sharifs are common in all three references. The references are related to different assets but all three name the same persons as accused.
Haris said nine and 13 witnesses have been named in the Flagship Investment Ltd reference and Al Azizia Steel Mills reference, respectively. Six witnesses are common in both references and three are common with those of Avenfield flats reference.
He argued that the same witnesses have to appear in different references if the three references were not clubbed. He said a single trial should be conducted against his clients.
Haris contended that the three cases should be clubbed and heard together as they were similar in nature, saying that the defence and the prosecution of the three references were also the same.
After Haris completed his arguments, Nawaz Sharif, his daughter Maryam and son-in-law Capt. (retd) Safdar left the courtroom with permission of the court. Later, opposing the defence counsel’s arguments, National Accountability Bureau (NAB)’s prosecutor Waqas Malik said that although the primary accused in all references is same, the references were filed separately due to different crimes and transactions.
He said each nominated person had an individual role in each asset and Al Azizia Steel Mills reference.
The prosecutor argued that the witnesses are common in three references but they have to provide different documents for the case record. He said as Hassan and Hussain Nawaz had not joined the court proceeding, the three cases couldn’t be clubbed for together hearing. — APP