Zardari acquittal: IHC directs office to set date for hearing appeals

ISLAMABAD:

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Wednesday directed the registrar office to fix a date for hearing two National Accountability Bureau (NAB) appeals against the acquittal of former president Asif Zardari in corruption cases.

An IHC bench comprising Justice Noorul Haq N Qureshi and Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui issued the directives while taking up the appeals against Zardari’s acquittal by an accountability court in the ARY Gold and Ursus tractor cases.

The Ursus tractor case pertains to the alleged misappropriation of Rs150,000 each in the purchase of 5,900 Polish and Russian-made tractors under a scheme launched by the Pakistan People’s Party government in the 1990s.

The ARY reference relates to the alleged illegal grant of licences to ARY traders for the import of silver and gold, which is blamed for costing the national exchequer nearly Rs18.2 million.

NAB has pleaded for the IHC to declare the accountability court verdict null and void.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 26^th, 2015.