PTI to open new legal front against Shahbaz

Imran’s party is likely to file a petition against Punjab CM in LHC by next week

ISLAMABAD: After the Panamagate case in which Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s main target has been Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his children, Imran Khan’s party is all set to open another front, this time against the PM’s brother and Punjab chief minister, Shahbaz Sharif.

Sources close to senior lawyer Babar Awan’s law firm told The Express Tribune that PTI Secretary General Jahangir Tareen has given them the task of drafting a petition seeking the Punjab CM’s disqualification on grounds of Al Towfeek case.



The PTI has already made some reference to this case in its ongoing legal fight against the alleged corruption of the ruling family in the Supreme Court and has recently attached some documents of this case as supplementary evidence.

On the basis of the newly submitted documents, the PTI wants to prove before the top court that the Sharif family owned their London properties much before 2006.

During the last hearing of the case this Wednesday, the judges had asked the PTI counsel to prove that the Sharif family had acquired the London properties before 2006.

The PTI, in its initial petition, had not made Shahbaz Sharif a party in the case. As a remedy to what the PTI feels was its mistake, the party has now decided to file a separate petition involving Shahbaz.

Confirming the development, a close aide to Awan said it is likely that the petition will be filed in the Lahore High Court (LHC). “It has yet to decide which forum should be availed for his [Shahbaz’s] disqualification, but there are more chances that the petition will be submitted in the LHC by next week,” he added.



According to the PTI legal team, Shahbaz Sharif was one of the four defendants in the Al Towfeek Investment Fund case in London. After a London High Court order in 1999, he had paid $34 million.

“We would question how he had deposited this amount in a foreign country. [We would also question] the source of this money and mechanism for the transfer of such huge funds,” a member of the PTI team said.

There were four defendants in the Al Towfeek Investment Funds case. These were Hudabiya Paper Mills Ltd (first defendant), Shahbaz Sharif (second defendant), Mian Mohammad Sharif (third defendant) and Abbas Sharif (fourth defendant).

Two of the defendants — Mian Sharif [Shabaz’s father] and Abbas [his brother] — have passed away.

Besides the party’s legal battle against the Sharif family in the Panama leaks case, Tareen and Punjab chief minister are already in courts against each other in a number of cases.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 3^rd, 2016.