NAB summons Nawaz in Mir Shakil case

LAHORE: The country’s top accountability watchdog has summoned convicted former premier Nawaz Sharif on March 20 in connection with its inquiry into a 54-kanal land scandal involving Jang/Geo Editor-in-Chief Mir Shakilur Rehman.

The 70-year-old Sharif family patriarch is in London on bail for medical treatment.

Rahman was taken into custody at the National Accountability Bureau’s (NAB) Lahore office on Thursday after he had failed to give satisfactory answers to its 26-point questionnaire about the purchase of a 54-kanal land.

According to NAB, Rahman had illegally acquired 54 plots, each measuring one kanal, at Canal Bank in H-Block of Lahore’s Johar Town in 1986 in connivance with then Punjab chief minister Nawaz Sharif

The owner of the Jang/Geo Group was remanded in NAB custody for 12 days by a court the next day.

NAB wants to interrogate Nawaz about why he had approved the allotment of the land to Rahman in violation of rules.

Under the Lahore Development Authority (LDA) rules, exemption could be granted for 15 plots only. However, 54 plots were exempted in a single block on approval of Nawaz, who was then the Punjab CM. Under the exemption policy, 70% of the land was supposed to remain with the LDA but it was never transferred.