Insufficient evidence: Ghazan Hoti acquitted in multibillion weapons scam

Had been implicated over kickbacks; charges could not be proved in Rs2.03 billion case

PESHAWAR: After spending around 13 months behind bars in Central Prison Peshawar and another 21 days in the custody of National Accountability Bureau, Ghazan Hoti was acquitted in the multibillion-rupee case. Former chief minister Amir Haider Hoti’s brother, Ghazan had been accused of receiving kickbacks in the procurement of weapons and ammunition for police department in 2008-10; the charges could not be proved against him.

Accountability court judge Muhammad Ibrahim Khan accepted the application of Ghazan under Section 265-K of the Criminal Procedure Code which empowers the court to acquit an accused if there is insufficient evidence against him or her.

Plea deals

The court accepted the plea bargain made by Ghazan’s relative Raza Ali Khan. Under this application, Khan paid Rs224.4 million to the National Accountability Bureau. An application in this regard was earlier accepted by the NAB chairman.

When the hearing started on Friday, the investigation officer dealing with the Rs2.03 billion case, Inyatullah Khan, appeared before the court and recorded his statement. The investigation officer said Raza had confessed before the court that he had taken Rs195 million as kickbacks in the weapons contract.

“The amount taken by Raza Ali Khan was not given to Ghazan Hoti and during the investigation, we did not find any evidence to show the latter took kickbacks,” Inayatullah told the court. “The chairman already approved Raza’s plea bargain, worth Rs224.4 million.”

Cooperating with the law

Qazi Jawad Ihsanullah, Ghazan’s lawyer, told the court his client appeared at every hearing and came from abroad for this very purpose. The entire record shows his client was not involved in any kind of corruption and Raza did not share with him any money either, Ihsanullah argued.

After hearing arguments from both sides and the statement of the investigation officer, the court accepted the application for Ghazan’s acquittal. The application of Raza was also accepted. Both men have been released now.

A long trial

Ghazan Hoti was arrested on April 15, 2014 after Peshawar High Court refused to extend his pre-arrest bail. He spent 21 days in the custody of NAB after which he was sent to Central Prison Peshawar on May 7 last year. The high court rejected the post-arrest bail of Ghazan Hoti twice.

Culpabilities

Former IGP Malik Naveed Khan has also been arrested in the same case and his bail plea was rejected. The Supreme Court of Pakistan also rejected his bail and he was arrested on November 20, 2013 and is still in prison.

On March 31, PHC rejected the bail of Malik Naveed Khan for a second time. There is Rs360 million worth of liabilities against the accused in the reference. He has claimed deteriorating health as his cause for bail, but NAB told the court no medical board has been constituted to ascertain this claim.

Police budget officer Javed Khan was also arrested but NAB took him in for another case related to the possession of illegal assets.

Former chief minister Amir Haider Hoti’s adviser Niaz Ali Shah was also arrested on January 6, 2014 but he paid Rs20 million to NAB under the voluntarily return system after which he was released.

This Rs2.03 billion corruption reference was filed by NAB K-P on March 19, 2014. Ten suspects including six high-ranking police officials were named in this reference. Those named for alleged corruption are former Frontier Constabulary commandant Abdul Majeed Khan, former additional IGP operations Abdul Latif Khan, Central Police Office DIG Sajid Ali Khan, former budget officer Javed Khan, ex-AIG Establishment (CPO) Kashif Alam, former DIG telecommunication Sadiq Kamal Orakzai, former IGP Malik Naveed, Raza Ali Khan and Ghazan Hoti.

They were accused of corruption in a project in which the government had approved the purchase and upgrade of weapons and equipment for police use. An amount of over Rs7 billion was released by the federal and the provincial governments for recruitment, training of police personnel and procurement of weapons and equipment.

The NAB charge-sheet says an inspection committee was also found guilty of not carrying out tests of weapons, ammunition and equipment according to procedure. The relevant individuals have already been booked. The NAB has twice approached PHC seeking a direction to the accountability court to summon the six current and former police officers but both pleas were dismissed.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 16^th, 2015.