Shehbaz acquitted in Ashiana housing reference

An accountability court in Lahore on Saturday acquitted PML-N president and former premier Shehbaz Sharif in the Ashiana-e-Iqbal Housing Scheme reference filed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in 2018.

The court also acquitted other co-accused, including ex-bureaucrat and current interim Privatisation Minister Fawad Hasan Fawad; Lahore Development Authority (LDA) former director general and incumbent caretaker PM’s special assistant Ahad Khan Cheema; Bismillah Construction Company Chief Executive Shahid Shafiq; Bilal Kidwai; Imtiaz Haider; and Munir Zia.

The reference accused Shehbaz of misusing his authority during his tenure as the Punjab chief minister in the execution of the low-cost housing scheme launched in 2010 in Lahore.

According to the reference, Shehbaz connived with the then LDA DG Cheema to award the contract for the housing scheme to Lahore Casa Developers, a proxy group of Paragon City Private Limited, instead of the successful bidder. It also accused him of bypassing the powers of the Punjab Land Development Company (PLDC) board of directors to transfer the project to the LDA, which then awarded the contract to Lahore Casa Developers.

The anti-graft body had further accused the former premier of ordering the PLDC to award the consultancy services contract for the project to Engineering Consultancy Services Punjab for Rs192 million, even though the National Engineering Services Pakistan (Nespak) quoted its actual cost at Rs35 million.

NAB had claimed that Shehbaz’s actions in connection with the project inflicted a loss of around Rs660 million to the state exchequer and inflated its cost by Rs3.39 billion.

Shehbaz, Fawad, Cheema and many others were later rounded up in 2018. The ex-premier and others were indicted in the case in February 2019.

However in May this year, NAB said it found “no evidence” of corruption in the contract of the scheme. Last month, an accountability court acquitted two key suspects, Kamran Kayani and Nadeem Zia, in the reference.
On Saturday, the attorney general for Pakistan and NAB submitted their reports to the accountability court. The NAB prosecutor maintained that the Supreme Court’s decision on graft cases did not impact the current one.

Also read: NAB clears PM in Ashiana case

He added that the accused did not derive any benefit from the amended NAB law, emphasising that the reference was thoroughly examined on its merits.

On November 1, the court initially reserved its verdict after hearing arguments from both the applicants' lawyer and NAB prosecutors, with the intention to announce the verdict on November 7.

However, on the scheduled day, it postponed its proceedings, seeking clarification from NAB because of the perceived ambiguity arising from the Supreme Court order on October 31. It conveyed that the verdict in the case would be issued after interpretation of the apex court's order.

The Supreme Court, in its October 31 ruling, permitted accountability courts to continue proceedings in corruption cases but restrained them from issuing final orders.

On Saturday, the court accepted the acquittal applications filed by the ex-premier and others.
Speaking to the media outside the court, Cheema expressed his gratefulness to the Almighty for helping him pass through this “test”. He added that the “requirements of justice” had not been met. “Everyone saw when ‘injustice’ was carried out,” he continued.

PML-N leader and former federal information minister Marriyum Aurangzeb, in a post on X (formerly Twitter), also thanked the Almighty for the acquittal of her party president in a “false” case.

She also congratulated the party leadership and activists on Shehbaz’s acquittal.

Marriyum wrote that the public was now finding out how “false cases” were made to arrest her party president.
She continued that these “false cases: had wasted the country and public’s time as well money.