October 12,1998
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:PAKISTAN Account Ability Sharif faces another crisis in the form of graft charges and foreign accounts. By Zahid Hussain
It is becoming a case of moving from one crisis to another for Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. No sooner did he touch down at Islamabad last week after a trip to New York for the UN General Assembly than he faced charges of massive corruption, money laundering and defaulting on bank loans. Observer, a London newspaper, providing details from a 200-page FIA investigation report into Sharif's assets, broke the story that the prime minister and his family had been regularly siphoning off government money and depositing it in safe deposits abroad. The allegations hit home just when an International Monetary Fund team was visiting Pakistan to help the country overcome its economic crunch. Sharif's family was quick to term the Observer story "malicious" and threatened to sue the paper. But the Government's defence against the charges was feeble. The financial scandal is just the kind of charge-sheet Sharif's predecessor Benazir Bhutto faced when she was ousted from power in 1996. Many analysts describe the Observer story as the proverbial last straw for Sharif. It comes at a time when he is struggling for survival, faced as he is with a financial breakdown, mounting pressure against his Islamisation drive from within his own Pakistan Muslim League party and the possibility of an army takeover. Although most of the allegations of tax evasion, money laundering and default on bank loans are not new, the report is a political time bomb since it is for the first time that the prime minister and his family have been linked to offshore companies and bank accounts. The report -- copies of which were sent to President Rafiq Tarar and Army chief General Jehangir Karamat -- provides substantive details of Sharif's expensive flats in London and his foreign bank accounts. It charges the prime minister with amassing a huge personal fortune through kickbacks, tax evasion and government duties. Worryingly for the Government, Sharif and his relatives have never declared their overseas assets, either in their income tax returns or to the Election Commission, which is mandatory for all electoral candidates. Though the Government controls the levers on any further probe, the charges provide a window of opportunity for the Opposition and the army.
When Sharif returned to power in February 1997, the FIA investigation was terminated on grounds that it was politically motivated. Some reports say the administration also tried to erase the evidence of corruption. Rehman was not forgiven for the humiliation meted out to Sharif's father. He was arrested soon after Sharif assumed office and languished in jail for more than a year before the Supreme Court ordered his release on bail. He later fled the country taking with him the copy of his investigation report. Meanwhile, a group of individuals opposed to Sharif hired a private British detective firm to probe the family's overseas assets. The consolidated report landed at the Observer last week. The newspaper confirmed the veracity of the charges through its own sources before publishing the explosive story. For many in Pakistan it was an eye-opener that Sharif and his family had amassed massive wealth abroad. The Government though saw no substance in the FIA report. "It is politically motivated, prepared as it is by an officer who was given an out of turn promotion by Benazir," said Federal Law Minister Khalid Anwar. But the Government has so far failed to deny the allegations. A confidential report released by the State Bank of Pakistan has confirmed that Sharif's Ittefaq Group of Industries was among the largest bank loan defaulters in the country. Observers are not surprised that the astronomical rise of Sharif's family as one of the biggest business groups in the country in 10 years has coincided with his soaring political fortunes. The family owned only a small steel mill in Lahore before the late military dictator General Zia ul Haq appointed Sharif Punjab's finance minister in 1981. He later became chief minister of the province and prime minister in 1993. During that period the family built 32 more factories. Its industrial empire now comprises steel, textile, sugar and paper mills which, critics say, has been amassed through huge bank loans got through political influence. Tarar has come to Sharif's rescue by rejecting the report but the opposition parties have seized the opportunity, saying he should step down and face trial. Benazir, facing a battery of graft and abuse of power charges herself, is trying to tilt the scales by asking for the setting up of an independent commission to investigate the report. Also putting pressure is the right wing Jamaat-i-Islami with its deputy leader Rehmat Ilahi threatening a countrywide agitation. Babar, who ordered the investigation, says there is evidence to show that Sharif illegally transferred millions of dollars from the country. The Observer report, he says, is only the tip of the iceberg. This is the second major financial scandal which involves the prime minister. Earlier this year the Sharif family was accused of having built a palatial farmhouse in Raiwind near Lahore. The Rs 1.5 billion estate was allegedly developed with government funds. The Observer report hit the prime minister when he had hardly recovered from the Raiwind issue. With Pakistan facing an economic crisis, charges of massive loot could not have come at a more inopportune moment for Sharif. It now appears that he is fighting a losing battle as he faces growing political isolation and opposition within the Pakistan Muslim League. It is not merely a case of being framed in a scandal. In Sharif's case, the charges have come when he already has enough problems -- each more insurmountable than the other. |
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Flats in London's upmarket Mayfair worth $5 million.
A foreign bank account with $70 million. A damning Pakistan Federal Investigation Agency
(FIA) report. Talk of an imminent army takeover. A belligerent opposition screaming,
"Go, Nawaz, go." 
Rehman Malik, a former FIA deputy chief,
started the investigation into Sharif's assets in 1994 when Benazir was the prime
minister. The FIA filed several cases of tax evasion, illegal transfer of money and
default on bank loans against Sharif's family, including his father Mian Mohammed Sharif.
Several of these cases are still pending in courts. During the Benazir government's tenure
Mian Sharif was even arrested and taken to jail in handcuffs. "The FIA had collected
strong evidence of massive wealth acquired by Sharif's family through illegal means,"
says General Naseerullah Babar, former interior minister who ordered the investigation. 
