Former Pakistani PM Sharif sentenced to 7 years for corruption

Former Pakistani leader Nawaz Sharif was sentenced to seven years in prison for corruption Monday, state media reported, the latest conviction in a series of allegations which saw him ousted from power last year.

Sharif, a three-time prime minister of Pakistan, has denied all the charges against him and claims he is being targeted by the country’s powerful security establishment.

Monday’s conviction, centered on family businesses in the Middle East, is his second stemming from a corruption investigation spurred by the Panama Papers leak, and comes as new Prime Minister Imran Khan has vowed to tackle endemic graft in Pakistan.

The court found the three-time prime minister was unable to prove the source of income for the ownership of a steel mill in Saudi Arabia, Geo News reported, publicly known as the Al Azizia Steel Mills.

Sharif was also fined the equivalent of $25 million.

Security was tight at the court Monday, with some scuffles breaking out between Sharif’s supporters and security forces, who responded with tear gas.

The Supreme Court disqualified Sharif from politics for life over the allegations last year, and directed an anti-corruption body to investigate three different charges regarding his family’s properties and businesses.

In July this year, he was convicted in one case revolving around family properties in London, and sentenced to ten years in prison.

He was in London at the time as his wife received cancer treatment, but returned to Pakistan days ahead of the election, only to be arrested and imprisoned on arrival.

He was released in September after Islamabad High Court suspended his sentence pending an appeal hearing. It was not immediately clear when he would return to prison after Monday’s verdict.

He was acquitted on the third charge, relating to business in the United Kingdom known as the Flagship Investments case.

Sharif has been prime minister three times but power has been a rough ride.

He was first expelled from office in 1993 on suspicion of corruption. He won an election in 1997, only to be ousted and exiled after a military coup in 1999.

He returned to Pakistan in 2007 and took power once more in 2013 until his ousting last year.

Sharif, however, denied the charges, accusing the government and the establishment — a term coined to designate the country’s powerful army — of unleashing “selective justice” against his party and family.

The court last week rejected Sharif’s request for postponement of the verdict for a week, as he wanted to submit some more documentary proof to support his case.

Hundreds of police paramilitary troops — many of them carrying anti-riot shields — surrounded the court from early in the morning to hold off Sharif’s supporters, who gathered in large numbers. Footage on local Geo TV showed police erecting barbed wire to prevent the flag-waiving activists of Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) party from entering the court premises.

Only a few party leaders and journalists were allowed to enter the small courtroom — already packed to capacity by lawyers and the judicial staff.

Sharif’s daughter and political heir Maryam Nawaz and son-in-Law Captain Mohammad Safdar had also been sentenced to seven years and one year in prison respectively in the same case. The two are also on bail.

Shehbaz Sharif, his younger brother and three-time chief minister of Punjab, the country’s most populous province, is already in NAB custody in connection with a housing scam. Hamza Shehbaz, Shehbaz Sharif’s son and the opposition leader in Punjab Assembly, is also facing inquiries in connection with multiple corruption cases.

Despite the arrests and clear opposition from the establishment, Sharif’s party placed second in the July general elections, securing 82 seats in the 342-member lower house.

The party bounced back in by-elections in October, clinching some key seats won by Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in the general elections. It included a seat won by Khan himself from Lahore in July.

Source: Daily Sabah