PHC dismisses NAB’s review petition

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Thursday dismissed the National Accountability Bureau (NAB)’s review petition seeking direction for the accountability court to summon six serving and retired police officers and frame charges against them in the multi-billion rupees weapons procurement case.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Muhammad Daud Khan dismissed NAB’s review petition against the high court decision in which the court had upheld the accountability court’s decision that refused to summon the six former and serving police officers in the case.
During hearing of the case, the NAB’s Deputy Prosecutor General Muhammad Jamil Khan submitted that it had provided evidence in original as well as supplementary references against the six police officers, but the accountability court had refused to summon them in the case involving the mega weapons scam.
Among the suspects are the then Frontier Constabulary Commandant Abdul Majeed Marwat, retired additional IGP Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (Operations) Abdul Latif Gandapur, DIG at Central Police Office Sajid Ali Khan, former DIG Headquarters Peshawar Mohammad Suleman, former AIG (Establishment) at the CPO Kashif Alam and the then DIG (Telecommunications) Sadiq Kamal Orakzai.
The NAB prosecutor submitted that on February 27, 2015 the Supreme Court of Pakistan had passed a judgment about framing of charges and summoning of the non-arrested accused charged in the reference.He requested the court to direct the accountability court to commence the trial in the case in the light of the recent judgment of the Supreme Court.
The NAB claimed that the six police officers were placed in column two of the case and under the NAB Ordinance it had no powers to arrest such accused. It argued that their case was referred to the accountability court for issuing their arrest order, but the court did not summon them in the case.
The accountability court judge Ibrahim Khan had observed in his decision that the position of the six serving and retired police officers was yet to be spelled out by the NAB authorities as per the law and under the relevant provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure.
The judge had observed that their status was neither highlighted nor defined as the reference filed by the NAB was silent in this regard. He felt they could be summoned once the NAB clearly spelled out their role in the case.
The reference of Rs2.03 billion was filed against 10 of the suspects, including Ameer Ghazan Hoti, his brother-in-law Raza Ali Khan, former provincial police officer Malik Naveed Khan, who also served as commandant of Frontier Constabulary, and seven other police officials.
In the weapons procurement scam in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police Department, several accused have already made plea bargain and voluntarily returned the pilfered money to secure their release.
The NAB had freed Niaz Ali Shah, the scion of well-known Peshawar family who served as an adviser to former Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief minister Ameer Haider Hoti after he voluntarily returned Rs20 million to the NAB. The NAB also freed Arshad Majeed, the private contractor and main accused after he turned approver and agreed to voluntarily return Rs102 million.
The NAB recently freed Raza Ali Khan, brother-in-law of Ameer Ghazan Hoti after he agreed to pay Rs224.25 million to it.After Raza Ali Khan’s plea bargain and return of the money with service charges to the NAB, the accountability court also acquitted Ameer Ghazan Hoti, the younger brother of former chief minister Ameer Haider Hoti, of corruption charges. The NAB did not object to his acquittal in the case. The accountability court has fixed June 6 for framing charges in the case against the former IGP Malik Naveed Khan and former police budget officer Javed Khan.