PPP co-chairperson and former president Asif Ali Zardari on Thursday obtained relief in nearly 25-year-old corruption cases with the Islamabad High Court dismissing the country’s top anti-graft body’s appeals against his acquittal by accountability courts in four references.
A two-member division bench headed by IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah heard the National Accountability Bureau’s (NAB) appeals against Zardari’s acquittal in ARY Gold, Ursus Tractors, SGS and Contecna references.
The PPP co-chairperson was acquitted in these cases in the years 2014 and 2015.
NAB Additional Prosecutor General Jahanzeb Bharwana appeared in the court and requested it to formally withdraw the appeals.
He argued that further pursuing these cases would be of no use as the available proof was based on photocopies, which did not comply with the law of evidence.
During the hearing, Justice Minallah told the prosecutor that “according to merit, you didn’t have a case”.
“The court told you many times that these appeals were not warranted on merit,” he added.
Agreeing with the judge, the prosecutor said that was why NAB had submitted a request to withdraw the appeals.
“We are accepting NAB’s request to withdraw the appeals and also dismissing them on the basis of merit,” the IHC chief justice said.
He noted that the appeals were not even justified on the basis of merit.
In 2020, NAB had informed the IHC that the records of the four old references filed against Zardari in the 1990s had gone missing.
Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq Khan asked Bharwana if he knew where the case records were.
Justice Minallah noted that at the previous hearing, the NAB prosecutor had said the records went missing while he was returning from the Lahore High Court.
The judge further asked the NAB prosecutor if the anti-graft body had investigated where the missing records went.
“Are you saying that the registrars made those records disappear?” the IHC chief justice asked Bharwana.
The NAB prosecutor reiterated that an inquiry on the matter had been ordered.
In December 2014, an accountability court had acquitted Zardari in two corruption references, Ursus tractors deal and ARY Gold, filed by NAB.
The Ursus reference was about the alleged misappropriation of funds in buying 5,900 Russian and Polish tractors at a cost of Rs150,000 each for the Awami Tractor Scheme.
As per the other reference, former premier Benazir Bhutto, Zardari and others allegedly allowed ARY Gold owner Haji Abdul Razzaq to import gold and silver without paying duties between 1995 and 1997, causing a major loss to the national exchequer.
In November 2015, Zardari was exonerated from the charges of using an official position for monetary benefits in the 1998 SGS-Cotecna corruption references.
The references accused Zardari and Benazir of receiving 6% of the total amount as kickbacks for awarding pre-shipment inspection contracts to SGS and Cotecna.
(With input from agencies)
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