Thursday, 5 January 2017

Panamagate hearing resumes: PM Nawaz responds to SC's questions

Panamagate hearing resumes: PM Nawaz responds to SC's questions

The PM's lawyer, Makhdoom Ali Khan, submitted details regarding various offices that Nawaz Sharif has held during his political career.
Headed by Justice Asif Saeed Khosa, the five-judge SC bench asked Makhdoom Ali Khan, the newly-engaged counsel for the prime minister, on Wednesday to apprise the court of the dates when Nawaz became PM twice, Punjab chief minister, as well as the provincial finance minister, and when he was out of the country during former president Pervez Musharraf’s government.
The court asked for the dates in yesterday's hearing against the backdrop of his interview to a private television channel in which he stated that he had parted ways with the family business in 1997.
The question became relevant in view of the allegations of a conflict of interest, especially when there was no money trail in the shape of banking transactions to establish how sale proceeds of the Gulf Steel Mills in the UAE got invested in Jeddah or Qatar, Justice Khosa observed earlier, wondering whether the then prime minister was using his official position for the transfer of the money.
Explaining further, Justice Khosa had observed that it was in 1999 that the family of the prime minister went to Saudi Arabia and it seemed that as sum of 12 million dirham — proceeds from the sale of Gulf Steel — remained parked somewhere and was even available for investment in Jeddah after a gap of almost two decades.

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