ISLAMABAD: Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif on Monday said he had neitherrequested the Supreme Court for an exemption from appearing in the hearingsof the corruption references against him and nor planned to do so.
Nawaz and his family are facing three corruption cases in theaccountability court after the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) filedreferences against them in light of the Supreme Court’s verdict in thePanama Papers case.
On Sunday, Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Mian Saqib Nisar had directedan accountability court to announce its verdict on all three corruptionreferences against Nawaz and his family within a month.link>link>
The top judge had remarked that the former premier along with his daughter,Maryam, could visit his ailing wife Begum Kulsoom Nawaz in London.
Chief Justice Nisar had asked Nawaz’s then-lawyer Khawaja Haris to informthe court of his client’s date of return from London. He had also said thatNawaz’s claim of being denied the permission to visit his ailing wife was away to gain publicity. “Request us verbally and we will grant thepermission [to visit Kulsoom],” the chief justice had said.
In response to a question whether the Supreme Court had granted Nawaz thepermission to be absent from court in the corruption references, Nawazdenied having made any request to the apex court.
“I neither made any such request and nor plan to do so,” he said in aninformal conversation with journalists outside the Federal Judicial Complexwhere he was present for the hearing of the Al-Azizia reference.