ISLAMABAD: The chief justice of the Lahore High Court on Saturday barred Pakistan’s national anti-graft body from taking into custody Hamza Shehbaz after it raided his home for a second day in a row to arrest him in two cases related to money laundering and possession of assets beyond means.
The NAB team reached 96- H Model Town, an ancestral home of the Sharif family, at 11am on Saturday but as of 330pm, they had failed to enter the house and arrest Shehbaz, blocked by guards and political loyalists.
Chaudhry Asghar, a National Accountability Bureau (NAB) deputy director leading the raiding team, told reporters the body planned to arrest Shehbaz “without fail today,” but a little after 4pm, Shehbaz’s lawyer, who had petitioned the Lahore High Court, received notice of protective bail until Monday.
NAB officials had carried out a first raid on the house on Friday but failed to arrest Shehbaz as private guards and loyalists present at the scene scuffled with them.
The bureau said it had arrest warrants for Shehbaz, who is a legislator in the Punjab provincial assembly, and the Supreme Court had made it clear that the anti-graft body did not need to inform suspects prior to their arrests.
Malik Muhammad Ahmed, the spokesman for the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz party of which Shehbaz Sharif is the president, said the NAB inspectors did not have arrest warrants.
Speaking to media after the unsuccessful raid, Hamza Shehbaz also reiterated that NAB officials came without warrants and had violated the sanctity of his home.
“I have a court order saying that I will be informed 10 days prior to arrest,” he said. “For the first time, I felt like we are terrorists, the way the raid was conducted,” he added, saying he had always cooperated with NAB authorities and appeared before the body whenever was summoned.
“What was the need for this step?” Shehbaz said. “I am not afraid of arrest but NAB used unlawful tactics because the government asked it to.”
Shahbaz Gill, a spokesman for the Punjab government, said NAB was an autonomous institution and did not require the government’s permission to carry out any action.
NAB has now summoned Sharif and his two sons, Hamza Shehbaz and Salman Shehbaz, to file their replies in the money laundering and possession of assets beyond means cases on April 9.
Shehbaz Sharif was arrested last October in a longstanding corruption case nine days before crucial by-elections were due to be held. His brother, ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, was sentenced last year to 10 years in prison by a NAB court after the Supreme Court removed him from power.
Nawaz Sharif has denounced corruption cases against him and his party’s leaders as politically motivated, and both brothers deny any wrongdoing.
