ISLAMABAD: An accountability court in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad on Tuesday ended proceedings in a case against Finance Minister Ishaq Dar for allegedly amassing wealth beyond his known sources of income, local media reported, with the judge observing the matter no longer falls under the court’s jurisdiction. 

The case against Dar, a close aide of Pakistan’s ruling party supremo Nawaz Sharif, was filed by Pakistan’s anti-corruption watchdog, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), in December 2017. It was among a slew of cases against the veteran politician, who was declared a proclaimed offender after he failed to show up for a number of court hearings the same year. 

The court suspended the arrest warrants after Dar, a 72-year-old chartered accountant, returned to the country in September after staying in London for five years in self-exile. The minister previously pleaded not guilty in the case, while his lawyer Qazi Misbah said NAB could not prove the allegations that Dar possessed assets beyond his means of income. 

An accountability, which reserved the verdict a day earlier, on Tuesday quashed the case on the basis of National Accountability (Second Amendment) Act 2022, which sought to reduce the scope of NAB. 

“After the [National Accountability (Second Amendment) Act 2022], this case does not fall under the jurisdiction of this court,” Pakistan’s Geo News channel quoted Judge Mohammad Bashir as saying at Tuesday’s proceedings. 

“We can neither announce a decision in favor of NAB nor can we issue a decision in favor of the suspect. The trial against Ishaq Dar ends here.” 

The National Accountability (Second Amendment) Act 2022, passed by both houses of Pakistan parliament in May, states that all “pending inquiries, investigations, trials or proceedings under this ordinance, relating to persons or transactions... shall stand transferred to the authorities, departments and courts concerned under the respective laws.” 

It restricts the country’s anti-corruption watchdog, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) from acting on federal, provincial or local tax matters and removes regulatory bodies from NAB’s domain. The bill reduces the four-year term of the NAB chairman and prosecutor-general to three years, sets a three-year term for judges of accountability courts, and makes it mandatory for them to decide a case within a year. 

Following the amendment, the report said, a number of accountability courts withdrew around 50 corruption cases against the accused, including Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, former Punjab chief minister Hamza Shahbaz, National Assembly Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf and former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gillani.