Business Recorder editorial Nov 11, 2017

Hudaibya case reopening A three-member bench of the Supreme Court (SC) will begin hearing a petition by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for reopening the Hudaibya Paper Mills case on November 13, 2017. The petition follows the Panama case in which former prime minister Nawaz Sharif was disqualified. In the judgement in that case, Justice Asif Saeed Khosa, who is also heading the bench in this case, had directed NAB to proceed against Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, who was not an accused in the original reference filed in 2000 as he had been pardoned after signing a confessional statement. Justice Khosa had also argued there was a flaw in the Lahore High Court’s (LHC’s) decision in 2014 to quash the reference and disallow reinvestigation by NAB while apparently accepting Dar’s plea that his confessional statement was extracted under duress. However, he had refrained from issuing directions to NAB to file a fresh case because that could be construed as compromising the impartiality of the appellate court. During the Panama case, the SC had given the NAB chairman a dressing down for refusal to file an appeal against the LHC verdict in the Hudaibya case. Now, with a new chairman in place, NAB has followed through on the commitment by its prosecutor general before the SC on September 15, 2017 to file an appeal within seven days, moving a separate application for the delay to be condoned. In its petition, NAB has argued that fresh material unearthed by the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) set up by the SC to investigate the Panama case necessitated reopening the Hudaibya reference before the relevant accountability court. The original reference in the Hudaibya case in 2000 had relied on Ishaq Dar’s confession to accuse the Sharif family of setting up Hudaibya Paper Mills to launder money under cover of the Economic Reforms Act 1992. Money was allegedly laundered by converting it into Foreign Exchange Bearer Certificates to be deposited in foreign currency accounts opened in the name of benamidars and friends by forging the signatures of the ostensible account holders. These foreign currency accounts were then used as collateral for credit lines in rupees for Hudaibya Mills. The laundered money, shown as share deposit equity of Hudaibya Mills, was used to retire the liabilities of the mill and other allied companies of the group amounting to Rs 642.7 million. Another sum of Rs 600 million was transferred from abroad for settling borrowings from Al Tawfeeq Bank, which was actually owned by the Sharifs. Thus a total sum of Rs 1.2 billion was allegedly amassed by the Sharif family. If the SC accepts NAB’s plea to reopen the case, it would put Nawaz Sharif, Shahbaz Sharif, their mother Shamim Akhtar, Maryam Safdar, Hussain Nawaz and Hamza Shahbaz in the dock when other corruption references against most of them are already in motion in the accountability courts. The significance of the Hudaibya reference, however, lies in the inclusion in the list of accused of Chief Minster Punjab Shahbaz Sharif, who is considered most likely to replace Nawaz as prime minister if the PML-N wins the 2018 elections. That succession plan now has acquired a spanner in the works because of the possible resurrection of the Hudaibya reference. Given the set of circumstances the Sharifs find themselves in with the legal noose tightening around them, Nawaz and Maryam’s strategy of playing on the front foot and aggressively taking on all comers, including powerful state institutions, albeit indirectly, needs revisiting. Whether the Sharifs can ride out or emerge unscathed from their legal travails or not, their troubles may find reflection in further uncertainty and instability, rocking the boat of democracy once again.