PM Shehbaz, Hamza’s money-laundering case extends till Oct 8

Web Desk (LTN NEWS): Hearing in an Rs16 billion money laundering case against PM Shehbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shahbaz was put off until October 8. The case was brought by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

Hamza did not attend today’s court hearing because he had asked for a medical exemption. The prime minister also asked to be excused from the hearing because he had “important” things to do.

PM Shehbaz also told the court that there was a “fake case” against him and that he had made several decisions that hurt his family business to help the people.

PM Shehbaz’s lawyer, Amjad Pervaiz, made his case today and will do so again at the next hearing.

In July, the prime minister and his son, a top leader in the PML-N, got bail in the case by putting up Rs1 million each in bail bonds.

The hearing

At first, the premier’s attorney, Amjad Pervaiz, told the court that his client would be there soon. Soon after, the leader of the country showed up at the hearing.

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Pervaiz began his case by saying that the first information report (FIR) filed against his clients said they had laundered Rs25 billion through fake companies from 2008 to 2018.

“The accusations are of a general kind. The FIR also says that companies owned by the Sharif Group were used to hide money. But during those 10 years, Shehbaz was neither the head of those companies nor a shareholder in them.”

Pervaiz said that the FIR was filed after an investigation and that Shehbaz was not mentioned in the first few paragraphs of the report.

The lawyer told the judge that it was up to the person to decide whether to keep moveable or fixed property. At this point, Judge Aijaz Awan said that if they didn’t report it, it would be considered “black money.”

“If that’s true, the FIA would have done something. This FIR was filed when the last government was in power. In cases filed during the last government’s time in office, the court has already said that the FIA was used for political manipulation “the lawyer made clear.

Pervaiz told the court that the FIR doesn’t say that low-paid workers said they opened bank accounts because PM Shehbaz told them to.

Pervaiz said that the prosecution says Shehbaz was hiding Rs4 billion that he made from selling sugar. However, we still need to look at the FIR to see if this falls under the FIA’s authority or not.

“The Federal Board of Revenue or the department of income tax can do something about this,” he said.

“They use the name of the Sharif group for political reasons. Under the company’s ordinance, the name Sharif Group is not on file “he added.

During the hearing, Shehbaz’s plea was:

PM Shehbaz cut off his lawyer and said he wanted to talk. The court let it happen.

“I need to go to Islamabad for some important business. If you don’t mind, I’ll go. But first, I have something to say.”

PM Shehbaz told the court that during the 20 years he was chief minister of Punjab, he made decisions that “hurt” the sugar business his family owned.

“Sugar mills asked me to give them a subsidy, but I said no. I said no because the money would be used to help poor people in Punjab “he said.

PM said that the case against him for money laundering was “fake” and that he had never given a subsidy to sugar mills.

Even though he had a lot of other things to do, the prime minister said he had been given an important job during these hard times.

“The price of gasoline is going up. The country is getting flooded. Each dollar is important to us. People would not forgive me if the price of sugar went up because of what I did.”

He said that if Pakistan exports sugar, the country will get foreign exchange reserves, which no one wants to stop.

Shehbaz left after the court said he could.