ISLAMABAD – The Supreme Court (SC) on Thursday announced the names of members of the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) that would probe alleged laundering of Rs 35 billion through fake bank accounts, including former president Asif Zardari and his sister Faryal Talpur.
FIA’s Additional Director General (Economic Crime Wing) Ehsan Sadiq will head the JIT.
Other members of the high-profile inquiry committee include:
- Brigadier Shahid Parvez of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).
- Muhammad Afzal of Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP).
- NAB Islamabad Director Noman Aslam.
- Majid Hussain of State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).
- Tax Commissioner Imran Latif Minhas.
The JIT members and members of the FIA have been directed not to provide the media with any information regarding the investigation. Moreover, the responsibility of providing security to the team has been conferred upon Pakistan Rangers after the DG FIA expressed apprehensions.
The apex court has given the following mandate to the JIT:
- The JIT shall set up its Secretariat at a place convenient to it and have all powers relating to inquiries and investigations including those available in the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1908; National Accountability Ordinance, 1999; Federal Investigation Agency Act, 1974 and the Anti Corruption Laws, etc.
- All executive authorities or agencies in the country have been bound to provide assistance to the JIT in its working if deemed necessary.
- The JIT shall submit periodic reports to the Supreme Court on fortnightly basis under sealed cover.
- The Additional Director General FIA may co-opt any other expert necessary to complete the investigation in an effective manner.
- First report of the JIT shall be filed within a period of 15 days from Thursday (September 6th).
The apex court has rejected a request to move the investigation to Islamabad at the moment. However, the request can be re-examined.
According to the court’s order, the JIT has been formed due to reports of “slackness and slow progress” of the case and because of information that the “investigation was being obstructed and hampered”; the DG FIA had also confirmed the slow pace and the obstruction in the probe.
The FIA, in its progress report submitted in the Supreme Court, claimed to have identified two more companies belonging to the Zardari Group — M/s Landmarks and National Gases (Pvt) Limited — in connection with the alleged laundering of billions of rupees through benami accounts.
The agency said it came to know of the companies from a hard disk confiscated during a raid on Khoski Sugar Mills — an Omni Group-owned facility whose head Anwar Majeed is a close confidant of Asif Zardari.
PPP co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari, his sibling Faryal Talpur and several of their business associates are currently under the radar of the apex court as well as FIA as part of a 2015 case regarding fake accounts and fictitious transactions.
Initially, the magnitude of transactions was gauged at Rs35 billion through accounts in Summit Bank, Sindh Bank and UBL.
The case will now be heard in the Supreme Court on September 24.
