Chaudhry Shujaat, Pervaiz Elahi appear before NAB in assets case

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) leaders Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi appeared before the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Friday in a case related to their assets and wealth.

The NAB had summoned the PML-Q leaders for investigation relating to a case filed 12 years ago — before the tenure of General (retd) Pervez Musharraf, who they were allied with.

The Chaudhry cousins from Gujrat are facing inquiries of allegedly owning assets disproportionate to their known sources of income.

The two leaders, during their appearance, submitted NAB's questionnaire comprising 50 questions to a three-member team. The questions concerned details of purchase and sale of their properties. 

The NAB had earlier made government-level contacts with Deputy Commissioner Lahore and Gujranwala to obtain details of the assets of the two leaders and their children. Those details would now be matched with the answers submitted by Shujaat and Elahi.

The two leaders had appeared before the NAB Lahore office earlier in November as well, when they had recorded their statements before the three-member NAB team.

Speaking to media at that time, Elahi had said he was “not scared of investigations. This is not new for us, as during the Bhutto government, my family faced 135 cases.. I have always respected institutions.”

Chaudhry Shujaat, Pervaiz Elahi record statements with NAB Lahore

The Chaudhry cousins are facing inquiries of allegedly owning assets disproportionate to their known sources of income for which they could not reasonably account for

He had also said that it was up to his lawyers to see how similar his case was with Finance Minister Ishaq Dar’s.

Shujaat briefly remained prime minister of Pakistan in 2004 while his cousin, Elahi, was chief minister of Punjab from 2002 to 2007.

Before joining Gen (retd) Musharraf's government, they were associated with PML-Nawaz.