KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples’ Party (PPP) legislator Sharjeel Memon on Friday said that National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has a sympathetic attitude towards former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
Talking to journalists outside Sindh Assembly, Memon said NAB officials arrested him soon after his plane landed at Benazir Bhutto International Airport (BBIA) but the former premier Nawaz was exempted from such treatment.
The accountability body had been showing leniency towards Sharifs which is beyond my understanding, Memon who is also facing NAB cases in graft allegations, remarked.
Referring to NAB chairman’s statement that the anti-corruption body had an even-handed policy, Memon claimed he was put behind bars despite being granted a bail.
Denouncing the anti-corruption body’s ‘dual standards’, Memon inquired about the criteria of putting anyone’s name on Exit Control List.
He took a jibe at Nawaz for his involvement in ousting PPP governments. “Those who swept to power by pulling legs of a democratic government, how could they call themselves defenders of democracy,” he questioned.
Sharjeel Memon accused ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif of overthrowing Benazir Bhutto’s government.
The PPP leader said Nawaz was ‘a product of dictators’. “What would he know of ideology?” he asked.
Memon said while Nawaz was minting money through Islamic republic unions, Asif Ali Zardari remained imprisoned for 11 years in fake cases. “Prison is the second home of a PPP worker,” he stated.
Responding to a question regarding the heavy contingent of security forces deployed for Sharif family’s trip to the accountability court-owing to a large crowd of party workers- Memon said using state resources and ‘VIP protocol’ was wrong but added that it was the right of every worker to show support for their leader.
Memon, a close aide of former president and PPP Co-Chairperson Asif Ali Zardari, was nominated in a reference by NAB relating to alleged corruption in award of advertisements of the provincial government’s awareness campaigns in electronic media.
Published in Daily Times, November 4th 2017.
