NAB to start proceedings against Sharjeel Memon

Former information minister accused of embezzling public money

KARACHI: An accountability court directed on Saturday the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to initiate proceedings against former information minister Sharjeel Memon to declare him a proclaimed offender in a Rs5-billion graft case.

The accountability court-IV judge asked NAB to start the process of proclamation and attachment of property of the accused under the Code of Criminal Procedure over his repeated absence in court. A Pakistan Peoples Party leader, Memon, and more than 15 incumbent and former officials of the provincial information department as well as some private advertisement agents have been booked for allegedly embezzling more than Rs5 billion of public money. According to NAB, the accused misappropriated the funds allocated for public interest advertisement campaigns by the Sindh government to run on electronic media between 2013 and 2015.

At the outset of the hearing, an investigation officer submitted before judge Saad Qureshi a report in compliance with the non-bailable warrants of arrest issued for Memon at the last hearing. The officer contended that warrants being issued for past several hearing remain unexecuted for the accused had fled abroad.

The judge expressed displeasure over his apparent bid to escape the trial and ordered the IO to initiate the proceedings under section 87 and 88 of the CrPC against him. The next hearing of the case has been fixed on January 28.  Memon is said to be living in London. When the reference against him was brought up, he had approached the Sindh High Court for a protective bail, submitting that he wanted to return to the country to contest the charges but apprehended an arrest.

A protective bail barring agencies to arrest him was granted. He failed, however, to surrender before the trial court in time. The same bail was extended later after he requested for more time. But still he did not appear and once again asked extension which was rejected.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 15^th, 2017.