Broadsheet ends up paying £20,000 to Sharifs

Broadsheet LLC — the UK-based asset recovery firm – has paid £20,000 to the family of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif after withdrawing its claim over the family’s Avenfield property in London, reports said on Tuesday.

The firm made the payment to the Sharifs for the settlement of the family’s legal costs after having withdrawn the attachment application from the London High Court for the seizure and sale of four Avenfield apartments in the Broadsheet vs Pakistan/National Accountability Bureau (NAB) case.

According to a private TV channel, lawyers acting for the Sharif family confirmed that the payment had been received in their bank account. Broadsheet’s lawyers also confirmed making the payment, the report added.

Broadsheet was hired by Pakistan in 1999 to trace and recover assets of Sharif, his family members and around 170 other Pakistanis. On 19 June 2020, the company started the process in the London High Court for the recovery of money awarded through two court judgments.

Before starting the attachment process, Broadsheet had obtained arbitration awards from the Court of Arbitration against Pakistan/NAB for breach of contract and damages to the tune of $28.7 million.

Commenting on the development, Maryam Nawaz, daughter of Nawaz Sharif and Vice President of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), termed the payment by Broadsheet “another hard slap in the face of the clique of liars and mudslingers”.

“Broadsheet had to pay Rs4.5 million to the lawyers of Nawaz Sharif for raising questions about the London flats and then running away from the court,” she tweeted. “One ends up suffering such consequences in the game of lies and deceit. Any shame?”

In another tweet, she retorted that government authorities “had gone to catch corruption but got themselves out of the mess by paying Rs4.5m”. She also said that Broadsheet had been humiliated for its “false allegations” in court.

“The accountability of those people remains who kept squandering the Pakistani nation’s money in the war of their personal ego, those who used to meet Broadsheet officials and ask for their share. All facts will become apparent to the nation now.”