A large number of opposition politicians who were sent behind bars by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) after 2018 general elections as part of Prime Minister Imran Khan's election manifesto to punish the "corrupt", have almost all been released by the courts on bail except for Rafique and brother of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the Pakistan People's Party (PPP)'s Khursheed Shah.
The only politicians who are yet to secure bail from the courts in graft cases include opposition PML-N's Hamza Shahbaz, Khawaja Saad Rafique and his brother Salman Rafique, and PPP's Khursheed Shah. However, Khawaja Saad Rafique and Khawaja Salman Rafique who were also put behind the bars in 2018 are yet to get bails as all other politicians jailed in different corrupt cases have been released by the courts.
The prime minister came into power in 2018, vowing to root out the menace of corruption from the country. Since then several politicians, who remained unchallenged in the past, were sent behind bars in different cases. Following a disqualification in 2017, an accountability court had sentenced former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in 2018, to seven-year imprisonment in Al-Azizia reference case.
The same year, Shahbaz Sharif, the opposition leader in the National Assembly was also arrested but released on bail after serving a few months in jail. It was a shattering blow to the PPP on June 10, 2019 when the party co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari was arrested by the NAB just hours after the Islamabad High Court (IHC) recalled a pre-arrest bail granted to him and his sister Faryal Talpur in the fake accounts case. Meanwhile, on June 14, 2019 arrest warrants for PPP's Talpur were also issued after which the NAB declared her residence in Islamabad as a sub-jail and placed her under house arrest. On December 11, Zardari was finally granted bail by the IHC on medical grounds.
Troubling times continued for the Sharifs even in 2019. In August, the NAB arrested PML-N vice president Maryam Nawaz, as the latest high-profile detention of a member of the Sharif political dynasty. The daughter of former premier Nawaz Sharif was arrested with her cousin Yousaf Abbas Sharif in connection with the Chaudhry Sugar Mills (CSM) case.
The NAB got hold of them when they were attempting to visit her father at Lahore's Kot Lakhpat Jail, where he was being held after being convicted of graft. Maryam's father, Sharif, who was disqualified by the Supreme Court in 2017 from holding public office over accusations that eventually led to a seven-year jail sentence for receiving undeclared income, left for London on November 19, 2019 to seek medical treatment.
In September, 2019, the NAB's Sukkur chapter arrested senior PPP leader Khursheed Shah in Islamabad in a case pertaining to assets beyond means. In August 2019, the anti-corruption watchdog had converted an inquiry against Shah into an investigation. Shah faces charges of transferring an amenity plot in Sukkur Cooperative Society under his name to build a bungalow and owning hotels, filling stations and bungalows registered under the names of his front men and benami companies.
Senior PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal was arrested by the NAB on December 23, 2019 from the NAB's Rawalpindi office, where he had appeared to record his statement in the case regarding alleged corruption in Narowal Sports City (NSC) Project. Ahsan was granted bail on February 25, 2020 by Islamabad High Court (IHC).
The same IHC also granted bail to former Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi who had been arrested in July 2019 by the NAB in liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal project case. A search was also launched for former finance minister Miftah Ismail in the same case. He was, ultimately, nabbed the following month after the IHC rejected his plea for bail extension in the case on the grounds that there were no "extraordinary circumstances of hardship". He has also come out of jail after securing a bail.
The Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) had detained PML-N Punjab President Rana Sanaullah for allegedly possessing a huge amount of drugs in his vehicle, a claim which Sanaullah plainly denied. He was granted bail by the LHC on December 26, 2019 in the drug trafficking case.
In an unprecedented move, the country's top graft buster arrested Sindh Assembly Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani from a hotel in Islamabad in February 2019. He was arrested in connection with its probe into a case related to Durrani's "assets beyond his known sources of income". On December 13, 2019, he was granted bail by the SHC.
In February 2019, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader and senior Punjab minister, Aleem Khan, was taken into custody by the NAB in Lahore for having assets beyond known sources of income. Khan was sole leader from the ruling PTI who was arrested by the anti-graft body. He was granted bail by the LHC on May 15, 2019.
A NAB team had taken PPP leader Sharjeel Memon into custody on October 23, 2017 after SHC had rejected his bail plea. He was granted bail by the same court on June 25, 2019.
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