Court issues arrest warrants of Gilani and Makhdoom

ISLAMABAD – An Anti-Corruption Court on Thursday issued non-bailable warrants for the arrest of former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and Makhdoom Amin Fahim, leaders of the Pakistan People’s Party.

The order against the former prime minister and the senior PPP leader was issued after the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) presented a charge sheet with 12 cases relating to multi-million rupee scandal in the Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP) — registered against the two before the court.

Cases against the two PPP leaders, some former and serving senior officials of the TDAP and others were registered by FIA for their alleged involvement in approving and disbursing fraudulent trade subsidies of millions of rupees to several fake companies through fictitious claims and backdated cheques.

The court had previously issued notices to Gilani and Fahim, asking them to appear before it. However, the notices went ignored. Approving the FIA challan during hearing, the court issued non-bailable arrest warrants for the arrest of Gilani and Fahim and directed the police to arrest the accused and present them before the court in the next hearing of September 10.

On Wednesday, in what has been described as the first major action against the PPP leadership during the ongoing Karachi operation Dr Asim Hussain, a former federal minister and close aide to former president Asif Ali Zardari, was taken into custody. While the National Accountability Bureau denied having anything to do with Dr Hussain’s detention, Leader of Opposition in the National Assembly Khurshid Shah condemned the arrest.

The action came a day after Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif had directed the authorities to break the “evil nexus between terrorism, criminal mafias, violence and corruption” to achieve the objective of ensuring a peaceful and terror-free Karachi.