Process initiated to refer Shehbaz case to NAB
The reference, initially filed by NAB in February 2019, accuses Shehbaz Sharif and Hamza Shehbaz of misusing public funds to construct a 10-kilometre sludge carrier to benefit Ramzan Sugar Mills, which is owned by the Sharif family. PHOTO: FILE
An accountability court in Lahore on Wednesday started the process of referring a corruption reference filed against Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shehbaz during the PTI's era back to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in view of a recent Supreme Court verdict.
The Supreme Court on September 6 restored changes to the country's anti-graft law the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO), 1999accepting the federal government's appeal against its September 15, 2023 verdict.
On September 15, 2023, a three-member SC bench had accepted with a majority vote PTI founder Imran Khan's petition against amendments to the NAO, 1999 introduced during the last PML-N government.
The amendments included several changes in the NAO, 1999, including reducing the term of the NAB chairman and prosecutor general to three years, limiting NAB's jurisdiction to cases involving over Rs500 million, and transferring all pending inquiries, investigations, and trials to the relevant authorities.
When the duty judge at Lahore Accountability Court, Zubair Shehzad Kayani, resumed hearing the Ramzan Sugar Mills reference, counsels for Shehbaz and Hamza stated that after the SC's September 6 verdict, the accountability court could not hear the case as it involved an amount lesser than Rs500m.
The judge asked the accused to file applications to refer the reference back to NAB, stating that the court will hear these applications at the next hearing on October 1.