ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court on Wednesday granted pre-arrest bail to former president Asif Ali Zardari in a National Accountability Bureau case involving an apartment in an upscale New York neighbourhood purportedly owned by him.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Athar Minallah and Justice Aamer Farooq announced the decision in a hearing wherein the Pakistan Peoples Party co-chairperson appeared to pursue his application.
The court also directed him to submit surety bonds of Rs0.5 million, keeping the dirty money watchdog from arresting him until July 28.
The Pakistan Peoples Party co-chairperson submitted the request in response to a notice served on him by the dirty money watchdog inquiring about details of the unit.
The watchdog had issued a notice, along with a questionnaire, to the former president on June 15, seeking details of the apartment in Belaire Condominiums — a high-rise condominium apartment building in Manhattan — located at 524 East 72nd Street.
In the petition, Zardari insisted that the notice is “baseless and the allegations made therein are based on malafide intentions so as to malign” him.
“It is respectfully submitted that the petitioner is not in the ownership of any property in New York including [the] apartment as of the date mentioned in the notice,” the petition read.
The petition further said the agency had issued several call-up notices to the PPP co-chief in different matters “to politically damage his reputation”, and added that all those notices were assailed at different forums including at the high court.
Zardari, it mentioned, was suffering from several ailments and his earlier confinement had made his medical condition worse and said that he was currently under the special care of doctors who were monitoring his health.
The petition nominated NAB chief retired Justice Javed Iqbal, director general and three others as respondents.
In December 2018, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf filed an application before the Election Commission of Pakistan in Karachi seeking Zardari’s disqualification for “concealing” the apartment. In a complaint, a PTI MP from Karachi, Khurram Sher Zaman, alleged Zardari owned the apartment but had not declared it in his nomination for the 2018 general elections in which he returned to the National Assembly.
“Because of this act of his, Mr Asif Ali Zardari under the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and Rules of the Election Commission of Pakistan, […] as per the past precedent, should be disqualified from holding public office under Article 62 (1)(f), as in my opinion, he ceases to be truthful and sagacious,” the application stated.
“This serious violation of the law needs to be examined by you since Mr Zardari is a former president of Pakistan and co-chairs one of the major political parties of this country.”
Another document that surfaced at the time showed one Mehreen Shah was granted the power of attorney for the condo unit by the former president.
Speaking outside the Islamabad High Court, in a thinly veiled assertion that he is being treated unfairly due to his ethnicity, former president Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday remarked that PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif’s domicile was “better” than his.
To this, he simply said, “Mian Sahab’s domicile is better than mine”.
He was referring to underlying resentment among Pakistan’s smaller ethnolinguistic groups against the dominant Punjabi ethnic group. Zardari had been told to show up in person for the hearing even though his counsel had pleaded that he not be required to do so due to his ill health.
When asked whether he would advise Nawaz to return to Pakistan, the PPP stalwart said he would not give anyone any advice, but if someone wants to, they can.
