SC issues notice against Zardari in Money Laundering Case

The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to former president Asif Ali Zardari in a suo motu case pertaining to money laundering of billions of rupees through fake accounts. He has been directed to submit reply by December 28.

Zardari, his sister Faryal Talpur and close aides Omni Group’s Anwar Majeed, former Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) chairman Hussain Lawai and Summit Bank Senior Vice-President Taha Raza are among those being investigated by a seven-member top court-constituted joint investigation team  led by Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Additional Director General Najaf Mirza.

A three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar and comprising Justice Umar Ata Bandial and Justice Ijaz ul Ahsan hearing the case at the apex court’s registry in Lahore, also froze assets of Omni Group.
In December 2015, the Federal Investigation Agency began a discreetly investigating certain bank accounts through which multi-billion rupee transactions have been made. According to FIA sources, information regarding the fake accounts came to the fore when an intelligence agency picked up a prominent money changer in an unrelated case.

As the monitoring and investigation of these suspicious accounts continued, it surfaced that five of these accounts in two banks – the Sindh Bank and Summit Bank – had been used for transactions worth around Rs15 billion.

Investigation showed the accounts were operated by fake companies. Funds were credited into these accounts from contractors with multi-billion rupee contracts with the Sindh government. The money was found to have been transferred to accounts of companies owned and operated by the Omni Group, whose chairperson, Anwar Majeed, is a close aide of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari. Another beneficiary was Nasir Lootah, the chairperson of Summit Bank and a member of Dubai’s ruling family.

The probe, however, was shelved. It resumed almost a year and a half later. FIA’s State Bank circle initiated a formal inquiry in January, 2018.

By June, the FIA had several high-profile names on its list but was unable to make headway – for several reasons. It was at his point that the Supreme Court intervened. Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar took suo motu notice of the ‘slow progress’ in the money laundering case.

In July, Zardari’s close aides; Hussain Lawai, Taha Raza and two others were arrested. Subsequently, the first case was registered in the mega-corruption scandal.
The FIA submitted its report to the apex court on July 8 which revealed a web of companies and accounts that were being used to transfer billions of rupees.

In all, 29 accounts were identified that received payments, totaling at least Rs35 billion.

In August, Omni Group chief Anwar Majeed was arrested along with son Abdul Ghani Majeed when they returned to the country on being summoned by the apex court. They are now on judicial remand

Meanwhile, Asif Ali Zardari and Faryal Talpur have appeared before the investigators and have since secured interim bail from the Banking Court. The last hearing of the case was on December 21, when the duo got their fourth extension in the bail till January 7.
Amid complaints from the FIA and barbs flying in the Supreme Court, CJP Nisar ordered the formation of a Joint Investigation Team to quicken the pace of the investigation. One of FIA’s principal complaints was the lack of cooperation from the Sindh government.

Last week, the JIT submitted its final report to the Supreme Court.

The scope of the inquiry now includes over 300 persons of interest, scores of bank accounts and companies associated with them. At the centre of it, all are Anwar Majeed, his sons, bankers Hussain Lawai and Taha Raza, the incumbent and a former chief minister and two former chief secretaries, besides the leadership of Sindh’s ruling party,  Zardari and Talpur.
(Courtesy: Express Tribune)