Islamabad March 7 (TNS): A Supreme Court bench on Wednesday extended for two-month the timeframe for the trial court seized with corruption references against former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz and Muhammad Safdar to conclude the cases.
When a three-member bench headed by Ejaz Afzal took up the case on the progress report of the trial court regarding the references against the Sharifs and former finance minister Ishaq Dar, the NAB prosecutor presented the progress report along with a request of trial court judge Mohammad Bashir, seeking extension in the timeframe to adjudicate the corruption references.
In the Panama Papers verdict, the Supreme Court had asked the trial court to adjudicate the references against the Sharifs and Dar within six months.
Though the trial court judge had not specified the extended timeframe for concluding the cases, the NAB prosecutor explained that since Dar has been declared a proclaimed offender by the trial court, three other witnessed were yet to be arraigned. The NAB prosecutor said that it will probably take two months to conclude cases against the Sharifs and three months for doing away with the case against Dar.
Justice Ijazul Ahsan inquired from the NAB prosecutor how Dar became a senator when he has been declared offender by the trial court.
The NAB has filed three references and supplementary references against the Sharifs and one reference against Dar. The ex-premier Sharif, his daughter and the son-in-law have been appearing in the trial court while Dar has fled the country after appearing in the NAB court for a few hearings.
