Supreme Court
relief
The Supreme
Court has rejected the National Accountability Bureau’s appeal against the bail
granted to Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz and Captain (retd) Mohammad Safdar by the
Islamabad High Court in the Avenfield apartments case. An accountability court
had sentenced the three to 10 years, seven years and one year imprisonment respectively
on July 6, 2018. After spending about two months in jail, the Islamabad High Court
had provided them interim relief by accepting their bail application. As a
result, Maryam and Safdar were set free while Nawaz Sharif continues to
languish in jail because of the seven year imprisonment verdict by the
accountability court in the Al-Azizia case. While the Supreme Court
interrogated the National Accountability Bureau special prosecutor Akram Qureshi
on the grounds on which the Bureau was asking for the bail to be cancelled, he
was unable to satisfy the court. The Supreme Court asked whether Nawaz Sharif
or the others had violated the bail conditions in any way, reminding Akram Qureshi
that Nawaz Sharif had been appearing regularly before the accountability court
and in any case was already in jail. The then Chief Justice-designate Asif
Khosa inquired whether the National Accountability Bureau wanted its pound of
flesh, but then quickly added he may be blamed again for quoting from
literature (in this case Shakespeare’s Merchant
of Venice), an allusion to his famous Panama case judgement in which he had
quoted from Mario Puzo’s novel The
Godfather. The Supreme Court scrupulously avoided any discussion on the
merits of the case, while remarking that the Islamabad High Court had made
observations on this aspect but had clarified in its order that these were
tentative in nature. The Supreme Court informed Mr Qureshi that such
observations in any case were not going to impinge on the final outcome of the
case. Having brushed the question of merit aside, the apex court then bore down
on and grilled the National Accountability Bureau special prosecutor for cogent
reasons for interfering in (not normal practice in higher courts, it was
pointed out) and cancelling the bail. The whole affair took half an hour and
after the National Accountability Bureau special prosecutor signally failed to
satisfy the court, the appeal was dismissed.
The Pakistan Muslim
League-Nawaz has greeted this development with unconcealed joy. Other
commentators have speculated whether the relief from the Supreme Court will not
positively impact the other Al-Azizia case in terms of relief for Nawaz Sharif.
This may be highly premature, not based on any facts of the case, and skirting
dangerously close to discussion of a sub judice matter. Neither the Avenfield
nor the Al-Azizia references have by any stretch been finally adjudicated by
the Islamabad High Court. The former’s appeal against the accountability
verdict awaits a date while the latter will reportedly be heard by the Islamabad
High Court on January 21. It is understandable that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz
may wish to clutch at the straw that the Supreme Court’s relief seems to offer,
but since both cases are at the appeal stage in the Islamabad High Court, it
would be appropriate not to kite-fly at this juncture as to their outcome. Politically
of course the Supreme Court’s relief to Nawaz Sharif, his daughter and
son-in-law may legitimately provide grounds for hope. But beyond that, and as
far as the final outcome of both cases is concerned, the appeals process is far
from exhausted, with the possibility that a further appeal may lie to the Supreme
Court, whatever the final verdict in the Islamabad High Court.
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