- NAB to present Khawaja brothers in accountability court of Lahore today for securing the physical remand
- Saad Rafique says we are contesting the case of freedom of 210 million Pakistanis
- Says NAB is playing the role of a servant
LAHORE, December 11: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Tuesday arrested Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Khawaja Muhammad Saad Rafique and his brother Khawaja Muhammad Salman Rafique in connection to the Paragon Housing Society scam after the rejection of arrest before bail by the two-member Lahore High Court bench headed by Justice Tariq Abbasi.
The NAB will present Khawaja brothers in accountability court of Lahore today (Wednesday) for securing the physical remand.
The NAB prosecutor, after delivering his arguments before the bench, said that the brothers’ request for bail should be rejected by the court.
In his arguments, the bureau’s prosecutor said that NAB was conducting its investigation against the Khawaja brothers on the basis of the law and added that they were “certainly” linked to the Paragon Housing Society.
He said that Rafique’s wife had partnered with Qaisar Amin Butt in the housing scheme, and that the brothers had received money from the housing society.
“The Khawaja brothers have admitted that they took millions of rupees as commission,” the prosecutor claimed, adding that Saad’s brother-in-law was also a partner in the society.
“If money is earned through illegal means and still mentioned in tax returns, it doesn’t make it legitimate,” he contended.
The NAB prosecutor said that in a statement given to NAB, Shahid Butt, another one of the accused, had alleged that Saad used to come to every meeting and issue people allotment letters. He stated that the inquiry against the two brothers was initiated during the PML-N government.
“The NAB chairman has remained a judge,” he said. “He doesn’t have an animosity against nor friendship with anyone. He works according to the law.”
The Khawaja brothers’ counsel Amjad Parvez Advocate said that “from the total profit of the Executive Builders, only 6 per cent was taken by their clients,” adding that “they had declared whatever they had earned.”
The NAB prosecutor accused the brothers of “allotting one house to as many as three different persons” – to which Saad took exception and rejected the allegation.
Advocate Azam Nazir Tarar, another of the brothers’ counsels, told the court that their clients had not skipped even one of the hearings.
The deputy prosecutor general said that the petitioner can only be told the reason of their arrest, after their arrest and not before. “According to Section 24(d) of the NAB Ordinance, the reasons of arrest can be told afterwards,” he said. – Sabah
