Tag: FactFocus.

  • Ishaq Dar takes notice of ‘illegal, unwarranted’ leak of Gen Bajwa’s family’s tax records

    Ishaq Dar takes notice of ‘illegal, unwarranted’ leak of Gen Bajwa’s family’s tax records

    Finance Minister Ishaq Dar on Monday took notice of the “illegal and unwarranted” leakage of tax information of Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Qamar Javed Bajwa’s family members.

    An official statement from the Finance Division states, “This is clearly a violation of the complete confidentiality of tax information that the law provides.”

    This statement comes a day after a report by investigative news website FactFocus, which cited alleged tax returns and wealth statements, claimed that the COAS’ family had amassed billions of rupees in the last six years.

    “In view of this serious lapse on the part of to-date unknown functionaries, the finance minister has directed the Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on Revenue, Tariq Mehmood Pasha, to personally lead an immediate investigation into the violation of tax law[s] and breach of Federal Board of Revnue (FBR) data, affix responsibility and submit a report within 24 hours,” the handout said.

    According to the FactFocus report, the current market value of the known assets and businesses of the army chief, both within and outside Pakistan, amounted to Rs12.7 billion.

    The report also shared the alleged wealth statements of Gen Bajwa and his family from 2013 to 2021.

    According to the publication, it was unable to obtain data about assets in the name of Gen Bajwa’s two sons.

    FactFocus has claimed that after the publication of the story, the traffic on its site was “disrupted” and the website had been “banned”.

  • ‘Our lives are in danger,’ says firm that did the forensic of CJP Nisar’s leaked audio

    ‘Our lives are in danger,’ says firm that did the forensic of CJP Nisar’s leaked audio

    Garret Discovery, an American-based firm that conducted a forensic analysis of the alleged audio clip of former Chief Justice Saqib Nisar, took to Twitter and claimed that the company is being threatened for the work it had performed for FactFocus.

    “Today we received a call saying our lives are in danger and the same person said he is going to file in court against us for our work authenticating a file for FactFocus,” read the tweet from Garret Discovery’s Twitter handle.

    “Threatening our team to obtain a different result is unethical,” read the tweet.

    Earlier Garret Discovery had confirmed that they did work for FactFocus.

    “We did perform work for FactFocus. As part of our standard agreement, we have a confidentiality clause that prohibits us from speaking about the scope of work or work we performed,” a representative from Garret Discovery had revealed.

    “We have no problem releasing details as long as our client signs an agreement allowing us to do so. Please contact FactFocus with any inquiries as to the work we performed and discuss with them any release of information. We will not comment anymore on this issue until that time.”