An accountability court on Wednesday extended physical remand of Maryam Nawaz and her cousin Yousaf Abbas in Chaudhry Sugar Mills/money laundering case for another 14 days.
Earlier, the NAB special prosecutor submitted the request in writing and a report showing investigation in the case. The NAB in its progress report filed before the court claimed that the evidence so far collected by the investigators revealed that Maryam was involved in acts of corruption and she aided and abetted co-suspects including her father Nawaz Sharif and others in acquisition and laundering the funds of approximately Rs 2 billion disproportionate to known sources of income of the suspects.
It said Maryam was appointed as a director of M/s Chaudhry Sugar Mills in 1992 and she held the post till 1997. She served as chief executive officer of the mills during 1995-96 while she was holding 864,000 ordinary shares.
She became the largest shareholder of the mills during 2008 to 2010 having over 12 million shares (47 percent ownership). Meanwhile, Nawaz Sharif became the largest shareholder of the mills during 2015-16 with over 12 million shares (46 percent ownership), the report said.
The report further said documents revealed that Maryam acquired the shares of the mills from three foreign nationals namely Saeed Saif Bin Jabar Al-Sweidi, Hani Ahmad Jamjoom and Sheikh Zakauddin.
The report added that the suspect when confronted with the documents during the remand kept on changing her stance how she acquired largest number of shares in the mills.
"Initially the accused admitted these shares were purchased by her, later on accused stated that the said shares were just transferred in her name without any consideration," the report said.
The report further said the suspect claimed that her grandfather might have some understanding with the foreign nationals, however, she failed to come up with any plausible response when was told that the transactions in questions were made after the death of her grandfather.
The report further revealed that 11 million shares of the sugar mills were fraudulently transferred to a UAE national namely Naseer Abdullah Lootah and Maryam gifted seven million shares to co-suspect Yousaf Abbas to commit money laundering of around Rs410 million.
The shares transferred to Naseer Lootah were later transferred in the name of the suspect's brother Hussain Nawaz in December 2013.
The report said the suspects Maryam and Abbas were not cooperating with the investigators and withholding the information to defeat the process of inquiry. Therefore, further custody of the suspects was required, said the report that also mentioned bank accounts numbers of Abbas with amounts and dates of the suspected transactions.
The defence counsel in his brief arguments opposed the report and said the subject matter had already been probed by the NAB in light of the Supreme Court's judgment in Panama Papers. He argued that the ongoing inquiry amounted to double jeopardy and malicious prosecution.
The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) presented both suspects before the court under extra ordinary security arrangements taken outside the judicial complex.
The police closed all roads leading to the complex by placing containers, iron-fence and barbwires paralyzing movement of pedestrians and the traffic in the vicinity. Scores of party workers managed to reach the complex despite the barricades; however, they could not make it to the court.
PML-N leaders including Senator Pervez Rashid, former governor Sindh Muhammad Zubair, Shaista Pervez, MNA Ali Pervez, MPA Azma Bokhari and Capt Muhammad Safdar (retd) were able to attend the proceedings in a crowded courtroom.
The atmosphere inside the courtroom was almost suffocating when presiding judge Naeem Arshad resumed the hearing only to allow the request of the NAB in minutes for further remand of the suspects.
Maryam avoided responding to media queries when reporters approached her on way back to the NAB headquarters. After the hearing, Capt Safdar (retd) was also seen rescuing a party worker from the clutches of the police personnel. He even snatched a club from the hands of a cop who was about to hit the worker.
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