Zubair Qureshi
The Islamabad High Court has set aside freezing orders of several properties owned by the British Pakistani businessman Nisar Ahmed Afzal and cleared him of a £60m graft case observing that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had demonstrated high-handedness in several ways.
The case was instituted on the request of the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA in £60M alleged Birmingham Mortgage fraud case but Pakistan’s anti-graft agency failed to substantiate evidence against him.
The IHC’s Justice MohsinAkhtarKayani and Justice SardarEjazIshaq Khan in their judgment noted that several properties of NisarAfzal and family members were frozen in Islamabad by the NAB in November 2021 for the purpose of recovery but the NAB failed to file a reference or furnish any evidence against the British Pakistani family.
NAB had seized Afzal’s properties at a time when the UK’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO) had already announced in November 2021 it had dropped the investigation into NisarAfzal bringing the matter to a close. According to SFO, there was no realistic prospect of a successful conviction, primarily due to lack of evidence. However, the NAB authorities froze Afzal’s assets in 2021 on the UK government’s request which was sent originally in 2017. In 2021 the original case was already over.
The NAB froze around eight properties of Afzal which included those properties in Islamabad as well which were purchased long before the alleged offence in the UK.
The NCA through British High Commission Islamabad had lodged a complaint with Chairman NAB, alleging that two real brothers namely NisarAhmaedAfzal and Saghir Ahmed Afzal and others were involved in a £60 million Mortgage Fraud in UK in the year 2004-2006 and that Nisar Ahmad Afzal however fled away from UK to
Pakistan along with part proceeds of £26 million which were received in Pakistan bank accounts of Afzal’s family members and subsequently routed/layered and brought in their personal utilization to acquire properties. However, the IHC found that the NAB did nothing from 2017 onwards and moved to freeze properties in September 2021 and since then didn’t transmit the cases to Court of Session Judge or any other court under the law, nor it concluded the investigation report.
The court noted, “Even we have confronted the respondent NAB as to whether the matter was concluded to be settled by any court of law but nothing concrete has been demonstrated.”
