ISLAMABAD: The accountability court has on Monday resumed the hearing into the corruption reference filed against Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, which had earlier been postponed due to the unavailability of Dar’s legal counsel Khawaja Harris.
Earlier on Monday morning, Dar made his way to the court amid strict security. There is a heavy deployment of police and Frontier Constabulary personnel ensuring security around the judicial complex.
As the hearing went underway, Dar’s associate counsel Hussain Mufti informed the court that Dar’s lawyer would be available at noon for the hearing. The judge therefore, adjourned the hearing until noon on Monday.
Moreover, Dar’s urged the court to be allowed exemption from Monday’s hearing, but the request was turned down by the judge Mohammad Bashir, observing that the accused must attend the hearing when the prosecution witnesses record their statements.
This is the Dar’s fifth appearance before the accountability court in the corruption reference that was filed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the light of the Supreme Court’s verdict on July 28 in the Panama Papers case.
During the Monday’s court proceedings, NAB’s fourth witness, Masood Ghani of Habib Bank, is expected to record his statement with the court and then be cross-examined by Dar’s counsel.
The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) during the earlier hearing had presented two witnesses – Shahid Aziz of the National Investment Trust and Tariq Javed of the Al-Baraka Bank – before the Accountability Court to record their statements during hearing against Federal Minister for Finance Senator Ishaq Dar in corruption reference.
The NAB has already submitted a list of 28 witnesses with the court.
During the hearing, witness Shahid Aziz informed the court that Senator Dar had invested Rs120 million as a finance minister in 2015, but he withdrew this money from the trust after the Panama Papers case was initiated in January 2017.
Prosecution’s witness Tariq Javed submitted the details of Senator Dar’s five accounts – belonging to his two companies and spouse: details of the bank accounts of Dar’s wife and the companies Hajveri Modarba and Hajveri Holdings.
Javed told the court that Senator Dar had opened an account in the bank’s Lahore branch in 1991, and added that Tabassum Ishaq Dar was also an account holder in the bank and owns a company – HDS Securities Private Limited.
Dar’s counsel Khawaja Muhammad Haris while cross-examining the witnesses had argued about the legitimacy of the submitted documents.He had said that the electronic statement cannot be taken as primary evidence and asked the court to add his objection in the record.
Hello, my name is Jack Sparrow. I'm a 50 year old self-employed Pirate from the Caribbean.