On Nawaz Sharif’s advice: Abbasi agrees to move bail application

ISLAMABAD: PML-N leader and former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has agreed to move his bail application after direct intervention by his ailing leader and PML-N Quaid Muhammad Nawaz Sharif from London.

His case is being heard by an accountability court in Islamabad. He’s been in prison since July last year and underwent two sensitive surgeries in between. In one surgery, his gallbladder was removed.

Well-placed sources close to Abbasi said he was unwilling to submit bail application insisting that since he was innocent and had served the country selflessly, the case against him should be withdrawn by the authorities concerned. Abbasi has throughout been asking for live coverage by the TV of hearing the case against him as he forcefully pleaded his innocence and termed case against him sheer witch-hunt. Sources said Nawaz Sharif had conveyed the message to Shahid Abbasi through his son and he had also asked former federal finance minister Miftah Ismail to approach Abbasi for moving the bail.

Nawaz Sharif has instructed Abbasi to contest the baseless allegations after coming out of jail.

Wasting energies in facing accountability based on political vendetta will serve no purpose, Nawaz Sharif was quoted as saying. Abbasi, on judicial remand in the LNG case, has been refusing to file a bail plea. Miftah Ismail and former managing director PSO Imranul Haq who were also implicated in the same case were released by the court on bail last year. Abbasi’s sister Barrister Saadia Abbasi had planned to move for bail application on her behalf as kith and kin recently but he stopped her.

Earlier, on Jan 21, an accountability court extended the judicial remand of Shahid Khaqan Abbasi till Feb 4 in the LNG reference. The court had granted exemption to former finance minister Miftah Ismail from appearing in the hearing.

The source said that Abbasi’s family will meet with the PML-N leaders today (Monday) where a strategy will be finalized for submission of bail application.

It is likely that Barrister Zafarullah will appear on behalf of Shahid Khaqan Abbasi for bail who is also principal counsel in the case.