Pakistan's anti-corruption body summons PML-N chief Shehbaz Sharif in Ashiana housing scandal case

Islamabad: Pakistan’s anti-corruption body has summoned the beleaguered chief of the PML-N party and former Punjab chief minister Shehbaz Sharif to appear before it on 20 August in a housing scandal case, according to a media report on Wednesday. [caption id=“attachment_4187537” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File image of Shehbaz Sharif. Reuters[/caption] Shehbaz, the younger brother of jailed former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, is already under pressure after his Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party failed to return to power in Islamabad and looks certain to yield to Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in the crucial Punjab provinicial assembly. The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has summoned PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif in relation to the Ashiana housing scandal, Geo News reported. He has been ordered to appear before the accountability bureau on 20 August for the hearing of Ashiana housing scandal as well as the power company case. Shehbaz, 66, has already appeared before the NAB in the case while former Lahore Development Authority chairman Ahad Cheema is on judicial remand after having been arrested over the case, the report said. Last month the accountability bureau arrested senior bureaucrat Fawad Hassan Fawad in various corruption cases, including the Ashiana Iqbal Housing Scheme case. Quoting sources, the report said that Shehbaz was summoned by the NAB after revelations made by Fawad during interrogation. According to NAB officials, Fawad wrongfully awarded the Rs 14 billion Ashiana-e-Iqbal Housing Scheme’s contract to ‘favourites’, illegally ordered the shifting of nine Compressed Natural Gas stations and also worked in a private bank from 2005 to 2006 without official permission. Fawad has served as former prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s principal secretary. Sharif was sentenced by a NAB court to 10 years in jail in a corruption case over the family’s ownership of four luxury flats in London. Fawad was removed from the post of principal secretary on 1 June this year and was appointed director general of Civil Services Academy, Lahore. The accused bureaucrat was also being probed by the NAB for possession of assets beyond known sources of income, the report said.