ISLAMABAD: The Accountability Court Islamabad on Friday fixed December 21 for indictment of former prime minister and senior leader of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani and others in a corruption case of award of alleged illegal advertising contract to a private advertising agency.

The Accountability Court-II Judge, Muhammad Azam Khan, while announcing reserved judgement, dismissed the acquittal applications of some of the accused persons including Muhammad Saleem, former principal information officer (PIO), Press Information Department (PID), Farooq Awan, former secretary Ministry of Information Technology (IT), and Riaz Asher Siddiqui, former chief executive officer (CEO), Universal Services Fund (USF), and Syed Hassan Shako , and fixed December 21 for framing of charges against them.

The court directed all accused including former premier Gilani to ensure their presence before it during the next hearing. At the start of the hearing, Gilani's counsel filed an application seeking one-day exemption of his client from personal appearance before it, which the court approved.

The NAB had filed a reference against Gilani and others in the Accountability Court for alleged misuse of authority in illegal publicity campaign, causing a loss of Rs128 million to the national exchequer.

According to the NAB, in the 26th USF meeting dated December 28, 2011, accused Gilani, being then minister in-charge for IT and chairman USF, directed to run a media campaign for highlighting the achievements of the USF. Farooq Awan, former secretary Ministry of IT, misused his authority in award of illegal publicity campaign through Midas (Pvt) Ltd against rules, and attempted to cause loss to the national exchequer.

The Midas CEO, Inam Akbar, allegedly violated the PID instructions and prescribed procedures regarding media campaigns, and undertook the entire electronic media campaign without getting any written orders (release order) neither from the Ministry of IT nor from the USF and served bill for payment.

The media campaign was launched by Midas (Pvt) Ltd, which was not on the panel of the USF, neither before nor afterwards. However, it was manipulated by accused, Riaz Asher Siddique, CEO USF, to place it on the panel in connivance with accused, Muhammad Saleem, PIO, and the PID to legitimise the media campaign and facilitate payment of Rs 128 million.

There was no competition held for formally awarding the media campaign, which is totally against the PPRA rules and policy guidelines by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and the PID.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020