ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Thursday accepted the plea of former National Insurance Company Limited (NICL) managing director (MD) Muhammad Ayaz Khan Niazi to remove his name from the Exist Control List (ECL) in a mega corruption scandal case.

A two-member SC bench comprising Justice Ijaz Ul Ahsan and Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail heard the case filed by Ayaz Niazi regarding withdrawal of orders dated July 12, 2018 and February 13, 2018 whereby his name was placed on the ECL.

During the course of proceedings, Ayaz Niazi’s counsel Rana Waqar said the apex court had ordered to include his client’s name in the ECL in 2018. The accountability court later acquitted Ayaz Niazi in the corruption case, but his name was still in the ECL, which could only be removed on the SC order. He pleaded the apex court to withdraw its order dated July 12, 2018.

The special prosecutor general of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) said the accused had been acquitted in the said reference but two more references were also pending. NAB had not filed an appeal against the accused in the instant case, he added.

Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail asked how long such a situation. NAB arrested a person and then an unending series of cases began. If the accused were acquitted in one case, then he was arrested in another one, he added.

The court accepted Ayaz Niazi’s plea and ordered that if his name was in the ECL in any other case it would be decided by the court concerned.