The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday disposed off as withdrawn a petition filed by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz President and Leader of the Opposition in National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif and his son, Leader of the Opposition in Punjab Assembly, Hamza Shehbaz, against the money laundering case registered by Federal Investigation Agency.
An LHC division bench headed by Chief Justice Muhammad Ameer Bhatti took up the petition.
At the outset of the hearing, Advocate Amjad Pervaiz, the counsel for the petitioners, argued that two state agencies, FIA and NAB, were investigating the same allegations.
He argued that the act of both institutions was not justifiable legally and stated that both the special court of banking crimes and an accountability court were conducting proceedings into the same allegations of money laundering.
At this, Chief Justice Bhatti asked the counsel how LHC could stop this case when they [the petitioners] did not raise an objection before the trial court.
“In your petition, only the actions of FIA have been challenged. So, we can’t say anything until we look into the matter with the National Accountability Bureau (NAB),” the CJ observed, while addressing the counsel for the petitioner.
In response, the counsel for the petitioner asked the court to allow him to withdraw the petition so that he could file a fresh petition to challenge the acts of both FIA and NAB in the case.
After hearing his initial arguments, the bench accepted his plea and disposed off the petition as withdrawn.
PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shehbaz challenged before the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Wednesday the money laundering case registered against them by the FIA.
