ISLAMABAD: Pakistani Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah said on Saturday former prime minister Imran Khan was the "mastermind" of a "bogus" drug case registered against him in 2019, with the connivance of then anti-corruption czar Shahzad Akbar and former director-general of the Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF).
Sanaullah's comments come as the drug case against him is once again headline news in Pakistan amid questions it was politically motivated as part of a campaign against close aides of three-time former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
The ANF arrested Sanaullah while he was travelling from Faisalabad to Lahore on July 1, 2019, and said it had seized 15 kilograms of heroin from his vehicle. Sanaullah, then an opposition member, remained in custody for nearly six months, before being granted bail on December 24, 2019. The case against him is still ongoing.
The Khan regime — which was ousted in April when Khan lost a parliamentary vote of no-confidence — vociferously backed the charges against Sanaullah along with the former ANF DG, Maj Gen Arif Malik.
On Saturday, Sanaullah said Khan had framed him in the case with the connivance of his aide on accountability and the then ANF director-general. The minister said he has lodged a formal complaint with the army chief against officials of the ANF, which functions under Pakistan's powerful army.
The army and the ANF have not yet commented on the statement.
"Imran Khan was the mastermind of the bogus case of 15-Kilo heroin against me whereas Shahzad Akbar and Former DG ANF were complicit in this abominable act. Shahzad Akbar impelled the Capital Police to place a bag of 15-Kilo heroin in my lodge which refused to do so," the interior minister said on Twitter.
"All the proceedings were undertaken on the directives of the former premier who wanted me behind the bars due to his personal enmity. I wrote and spoke to the COAS on ANF’s role in framing a spurious and mala fide case against me."
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">All the proceedings were undertaken on the directives of the former premier who wanted me behind the bars due to his personal enmity. I wrote and spoke to the COAS on ANF’s role in framing a spurious and mala fide case against me.</p>— Rana SanaUllah Khan (@RanaSanaullahPK) <a href="https://www.arabnews.com/%3Ca%20href%3D"https://twitter.com/RanaSanaullahPK/status/1545709034229174273?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">https://twitter.com/RanaSanaullahPK/status/1545709034229174273?ref_src=t...">July 9, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://www.arabnews.com/%3Ca%20href%3D"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js">https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
This week, Chaudhry Fawad Hussain, a spokesman for Khan's party, publicly admitted the closely-watches case against Sanaullah was "rubbish" and called it an "injustice."
In an interview with Express News on Thursday, Hussain said he had opposed the case when it was discussed by the cabinet at the time and had questioned the concerned ANF officer. Asad Umar, another senior member of Khan's party, said at a press conference on Friday that the case against Sanaullah was made by serving officers of the ANF and not by Khan's party.
Khan's then interior minister Shehryar Afridi had alleged the evidence against Sanaullah was solid and would pursue the case to its logical conclusion in court.
In an interview with Geo News channel on Friday, Sanaullah said as per his information, members of Khan's cabinet, Hussain, Ijaz Shah and Tariq Bashir Cheema, had opposed the case against him and termed it "'political victimization'."
He said Khan's accountability chief Shahzad Akbar had initially tried to pressurize the Islamabad police into placing a bag full of heroin into his lodge at the Parliament House, but the police refused to follow his directives.
"When the Islamabad police refused to carry this burden then this matter was settled with ANF and the then DG ANF Maj Gen Arif Malik certainly connived with them. Later, he received many personal gains and we have their evidence as well," he said on Geo News show "Naya Pakistan."
"There is no doubt that ANF personnel were involved in it… but the PM House was involved and the prime minister himself was personally involved in this abominable crime and victimization."
Khan has not yet commented on the accusations.
The interior minister said he had complained to Army Chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa in person as well as in writing and demanded he take action against the ANF officials, who he alleged had worked with the former government to frame him in the case.
"I have given a formal application to him (army chief) that these individuals were involved in this matter and you should take action on this and that the uniform has been insulted and they have been involved in this and it is your duty to take action on this," Sanaullah added.
