Islamabad: It was in 1999 when then dictator ruler and Pakistan Army Chief General Pervez Musharraf had hired the asset recovery firm, Broadsheet, to probe political opponents, including ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his family.
The list featured hundreds of other political personalities, including late Benazir Bhutto and her family, to find out stacked illegal assets and wealth abroad, alleging them of corruption and money laundering and putting charges against them through the country’s National Accountability Board (NAB).
However, after 21 years, the CEO of Broadsheet, Kaveh Moussavi, has come out confessing that he could not find a single rupee of illegal money or wealth related to Nawaz Sharif or any of his family members.
“We found a lot of plundered wealth linked to others, but I can categorically state after virtually 21 years of investigation that not one rupee was related to Nawaz Sharif or any member of his family. If anyone says otherwise, they are lying,” Moussavi said during an interview with a Geo television reporter in London.
“I have no hesitation in issuing an apology to the former Prime Minister for my being party to a scam and scandalous nonsense masquerading as the National Accountability Bureau (NAB). NAB is a fraud through and through,” he added.
In the past, Moussavi had claimed to have evidence of corruption against Nawaz Sharif and had even claimed that the Sharif family approached him with a bribe offer.
The Nawaz Sharif family had denied the allegations and even secured a payment of 20,000 GBP in litigation costs from the firm after it failed to lay the claims on Avenfield apartments.
It is pertinent to mention that Broadsheet LLC helped Musharraf government and the then established NAB to find foreign assets purchased through alleged illegal means and illegal funds.
The revelations hold massive value in reference to the politics of Pakistan as the ruling government of Prime Minister Imran Khan came to power after the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP) and the NAB accountability court found then sitting Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif guilty of maintaining assets beyond means abroad.
With Moussavi calling NAB an institution used to get at political rivals, concerns are being raised over its very existence and the overall process of accountability in Pakistan.
Opposition parties have been stating that NAB is working as a mercenary to Imran Khan and is making false cases against party leaders without any evidence or proof.
“Twenty-two years ago, after Musharraf asked us to investigate Nawaz Sharif, we started the probe and at every turn we found that the investigation was sabotaged, not because we were getting close, but because the intention was a witch hunt,” stated Moussavi.
Reacting to Moussavi’s revelation, Opposition party leader and Nawaz Sharif’s brother Shahbaz Sharif said: “Broadsheet CEO revelations exposed politically expired witch hunt of Nawaz Sharif and family in the name of so called accountability… corruption allegations were made to keep him out of public life.”
(IANS)
