Islamabad court adjourns hearing of Toshakhana vehicles case
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An accountability court (AC) in Islamabad could not pronounce the verdict it had reserved in the Toshakhana vehicles reference filed against President Asif Ali Zardari, former prime ministers Nawaz Sharif and Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani and others, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.
The decision to transfer the case either to the FIA or the special judge central could not be taken on Thursday as AC-III Judge Abida Sajjad was on leave.
The hearing of the case was adjourned until December 12.
Following the passage of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB )amendments, the accused had requested for the withdrawal of these references.
Two weeks ago, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had requested the court to transfer the reference to the court of Special Judge Central in the light of the restoration of the NAB amendments.
In the light of these amendments, a fraud of more than Rs500 million came under the jurisdiction of NAB, while the reference under discussion was related to a fraud of Rs48.2 million; therefore it didn’t fall in the jurisdiction of the anti-corruption watchdog.
In 2022, amendments to the accountability laws were made by then Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) government under which the term in office of the NAB chairman and that of prosecutor general was reduced to three years, the bureau’s jurisdiction was limited to cases involving amounts over Rs500 million, and transferring all pending inquiries, investigations, and trials to the relevant authorities.
Following this, former prime minister Imran Khan took the matter to the Supreme Court, challenging the amendments.
The Supreme Court on September 6 restored the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Amendment Bill by accepting the appeals of the federal government and others.
A five-member bench, headed by then Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa, gave the verdict by a majority 5-0.
The verdict said that Imran had failed to prove that the NAB Amendment Bill was unconstitutional.
Reporter: Hashir Warraich