Tag: LNG case

  • Miftah Ismail cries while remembering treatment meted out to his family by PTI govt

    Miftah Ismail cries while remembering treatment meted out to his family by PTI govt

    Miftah Ismail, former finance minister of Pakistan, got emotional during a talk show on Dawn News when journalist Wasatullah Khan asked him about his feelings after the recent “clean chit” he got from the court in the LNG case.

    Miftah remarked, “Today should have been a happy day but it was a bitter day for me because of memories.”

    Miftah broke down then, getting teary-eyed while saying, “They raided my home and breached my wife’s privacy by opening her closets.”

    “I remember this and I will take Imran Khan to the court,” said Miftah.

    He stated that an inquiry had already been conducted in Sindh in which he was exonerated and even though all the departments were based in Sindh but they opened a new inquiry on Sheikh Rashid’s request in Islamabad.

    He further said, “I will take Irfan Mangi to court who was the DG NAB in Islamabad, Javed Iqbal (DG NAB) and Imran Khan to court.”

  • Pakistani courts have become a ‘joke’, says ex-PM

    Pakistani courts have become a ‘joke’, says ex-PM

    Former prime minister and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has said that people laugh at the Pakistani courts as they have become a “joke”.

    The senior politician made these comments after an accountability court indicted him in LNG terminal and Pakistan State Oil appointments cases. The former prime minister along with others was implicated in both cases by the National Accountability Bureau.

    The PML-N leader has been accused of illegally appointing Sheikh Imranul Haq as the managing director of PSO and Yaqoob Sattar as the deputy managing director during his stint as petroleum minister. Abbasi’s son Abdullah and former finance minister Miftah Ismail are accused in the case.

    According to Geo News, the PML-N leader said people laugh at whatever is happening in our courts. According to Abbasi, he was handed a 26-page chargesheet that has 64 clauses. “Neither I nor over a dozen lawyers I talked have ever seen such long list before,” he said.

    The lawyers told me that it was not possible to have a chargesheet this long, he said, furthering commenting on the chargesheet. “They said only point 63 out of the 64 points in the document was the actual charge sheet,” the ex-PM added. This means the rest of the points are just added to insult me and the politicians of this country, he claimed.

    “One of the charges against me is that I changed the name of the Ministry of Petroleum to the Ministry of Energy during my tenure as the prime minister,” Abbasi added. 

    “This was my crime, according to this charge sheet. How is this in violation of any law?” he questioned.

    The PML-N stalwart asked NAB chief Javed Iqbal to debate with him if he has “courage”.

  • PML-N’s Miftah Ismail NAB-ed

    PML-N’s Miftah Ismail NAB-ed

    The National Accountancy Bureau (NAB) on Wednesday arrested Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader and former finance minister Miftah Ismail.

    Ismail, who was taken into custody from outside the courtroom after his pre-arrest bail plea was rejected, was wanted in the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) case in which ex-prime minister (PM) Shahid Khaqan was also arrested last month.

    The arrest comes a month after the PML-N leader was granted bail by the Sindh High Court (SHC). Earlier, a NAB team had also raided his residence in Karachi, but Ismail had evaded arrest and the bureau had to return empty-handed.

    After the expiration of his bail, Ismail had approached the Islamabad High Court (IHC).

    LNG CASE:

    The apex court in September 2018 had directed NAB to complete the inquiry against former premier Abbasi, Ismail and others for alleged corruption in the LNG contract.

    According to NAB, the contract allegedly cost billions of rupees to the national exchequer. In January 2019, NAB had interrogated Ismail in the same case.

    NAB documents show that the contract for LNG import and distribution was awarded to Elengy Terminal, a subsidiary of Engro, in 2013, in violation of the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) rules and relevant laws.