LAHORE : Changing the return plan for third time, ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is now scheduled to arrive in Pakistan on November 2.
He is currently in Jeddah where he performed Umrah along with his mother. The ex-premier will depart for London today where his wife Kulsoom is receiving medical treatment. He will then fly to Islamabad on Thursday from there.
Kulsoom has been battling lymphoma- a form of cancer. She began her first round of chemotherapy earlier this month in London and has undergone three surgeries since August.
While talking to reporters, Senator Pervez Rasheed said that Nawaz Sharif will become the part of judicial proceedings despite of all the reservations and will appear before the accountability court on November 3.
He maintained that NAB will not be able to prove anything against Sharif.
Rasheed pointed out NAB’s poor performance in the references against Ishaq Dar and said similar situation will happen in the case against Nawaz Sharif.
“This process of accountability is not only a test for Sharif family but also for the judiciary. We also have high expectations from the courts,” he said.
Earlier, it was reported that Nawaz Sharif will return to Pakistan from London on 7th January next year.
On October 19, the accountability court in Islamabad indicted the former prime minister as well as his daughter and son-in-law on corruption charges stemming from documents leaked from a Panama law firm.
A lawyer for the 67-year-old Sharif entered a plea of not guilty. Maryam Nawaz, and her husband, Capt (r) Safdar, also attended the hearing and pleaded not guilty.
On the same day, Sharif told reporters in London that he will go back to Pakistan to attend the next court hearing, scheduled for Oct. 26. In his televised comments, he said he was removed from office by judges on a trivial charge.
The charges stem from a trove of documents — known as the Panama Papers — that investigators say showed the family held unreported assets overseas. The family has denied any wrongdoing.
After leaving the courtroom, Maryam Sharif again denied the allegations as “baseless.” She said her father would return to Pakistan and that they would “face these cases with courage.”
The former prime minister is unlikely to be arrested on his return home as the court has already granted bail. Sharif’s political future has been in doubt since July, when the Supreme Court disqualified him from office over corruption charges.
Rana Sanaullah, a senior leader of Sharif’s party, the Pakistan Muslim League, said there were “hidden hands” behind his dismissal and the spate of corruption allegations, without elaborating.
