Shehbaz summoned on July 16 in Saaf Pani case

LAHORE: Former Punjab chief minister Shehbaz Sharif appeared before a combined investigations team (CIT) of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Wednesday in the Saaf Pani Company and Punjab Power Development Company Limited (PPDCL) corruption cases.

He had been summoned by NAB to appear on July 05 (today) but requested to let him appear on Wednesday instead.

The investigator added that Shehbaz was with the CIT for over an hour and a half, answering their queries. The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz president has now been re-summoned on July 16 by NAB in the PPDCL case, said an investigator.

In a call-up notice sent to Shehbaz on June 28, NAB had stated that during investigations against the management and officials of PPDCL it was revealed that Shehbaz was in possession of information related to unlawful nomination or appointment of Syed Farrukh Ali Shah in NEPRA and PPDCL.



Meanwhile, NAB summoned former Minister for Housing, Urban Development & Public Health Engineering Tanveer Aslam Malik on July 9 in the Punjab Saaf Pani Company Scandal. Malik appeared before a CIT at the NAB complex in Thokar Niaz Beg to answer the bureaus’ questions which believed that he also possessed information related to the case.

The company was initiated by Punjab government to provide clean drinking water to people. The Supreme Court of Pakistan had taken up the case during a suo motu hearing on public health.

During proceedings of the case, it was revealed that not a single drop of clean drinking water could be provided despite spending of millions of rupees. It was also revealed that irregular appointments, irregularities and embezzlements were also made in the project.

Earlier in the case, NAB arrested engineer Qamarul Islam, a PML-N candidate from NA-59 (Rawalpindi) against Chaudhry Nisar. Describing the grounds of the arrest of Islam, NAB had said that they had found the accused person serving as the chairman of the company was found involved in purchasing water filtration plants on higher rates.

Arrest

Meanwhile, NAB arrested another accused person in MNM Motorcycle Corruption case. The detained person was identified as Bilal Sharif who was arrested from Daroghawala over being involved in alleged corruption of at least Rs8.2 million according to NAB. He has also been accused of conspiring with prime accused Ahmad Siyal.



A few weeks ago, the accountability watchdog had arrested 17 accused persons in a single day and has detained at least 27 accused persons so far in the case. The accused are said to be involved in looting over Rs11 billion by hoaxing the public by extracting money from people on the guarantee of huge profits.