Islamabad: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) granted pre-emptive bail against arrest to former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani for a week here Tuesday.
Gilani, a key leader of Pakistan Peoples Party, had sought protective bail in nine corruption cases related to a scam in the Trade Development Authority, registered against him by the Federation Investigation (FIA).
Accompanied by his lawyers Gilani appeared before IHC judge Noorul Haq Qureshi who heard the bail plea.
An anti-corruption court based in southern port city of Karachi issued arrest warrants on August 28 against Gilani and former federal minister Ameen Fahim, also a PPP leader, who is currently abroad.
FIA had presented to the court a charge sheet against the two PPP leaders in a multi-billion rupee scandal in the government’s Trade Development Authority.
Gilani, who remained prime minister for five years after the PPP won the 2008 general election, talked to reporters after the court hearing.
He recalled that there was not a single case of political victimisation during his tenure.
He said the PPP had made great sacrifices for democracy in the country.
Referring to PPP commitment to fight terrorism and extremism, he said in 2009 the party’s government had launched the military operation that freed Swat region from Taliban control.
He said his party did not boycott polls after his son Ali Gilani was kidnapped just before the 2013 general election from hometown Multan in Punjab and remains missing to date.
Gilani regretted that former petroleum minister Dr Asiam Hussain, a close aide of PPP co-chairman and former president Asif Ali Zardari, had been arrested in Karachi by paramilitary Rangers on charges including abetting terrorism.
He wondered how people belonging to a party with known record of fighting terrorism and extremism could be accused on such grounds.
Referring to Zardari’s statement issued from London on Tuesday in which he blamed Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif for reverting to politics of revenge and vindictiveness witnessed in the 1990s, Gilani said the PPP co-chairman was deeply disappointed over the prevailing situation.
Asked if be believed the government was responsible, Gilani said the FIA was under the government control.
Information Minister Pervaiz Rashid said Tuesday that Zardari’s outburst appeared to be the result of misunderstanding or wrong information provided to him.
The minister said the government remains committed to the charter or democracy that had been signed in 2006 in London by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz leader Nawaz Sharif and the late PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto.
