Two offshore companies: Hussain beneficial owner: Maryam

Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's daughter Maryam Nawaz on Friday testified before the Accountability Court that her brother Hussain Nawaz is the real and beneficial owner of two offshore companies - Nielson and Nescoll - that own the Avenfield apartments. While recording her statement before the Accountability Court Judge Muhammad Bashir, Maryam said the Avenfield properties are owned by Hussain Nawaz. Hussain is the real and beneficial owner of two offshore companies that hold the properties and she was made trustee through trust deeds.
Maryam said the trust deeds related to the offshore companies Nielson and Nescoll were original but the head of joint investigation team (JIT) Wajid Zia made a false and misleading statement deliberately and maliciously before the court. "The JIT head had deliberately declared the trust deeds false in order to implicate me and my husband Captain Muhammad Safdar (retd) in the Avenfield properties reference," she claimed.
Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his son-in-law Capitan Muhammad Safdar (retd) were present in the courtroom during the proceedings. She said she had produced two trust deeds certified by the notary public as true and exact copies of original.
During the course of cross-examination, Zia had no option except to admit that it is no where written in the JIT report that she reaffirmed the deeds as original.
To a question about engagement of services of forensic expert Robert M Radley, she said that a so-called expert opinion for trust deeds was hired with mala fide intention. The manner under which the documents were sent to Radley and scope of assignment given to him in the light of evidence brought on record is highly suspected due to which Radley's report is not worth credence, she said.
Maryam said that Radely was hired by Akhtar Raja, Principal Quist Solicitor who is the first cousin of Wajid Zia. "Radley was hired through Raja to procure an utterly false and manipulated report suiting to the designs of JIT to implicate me and my husband in this case," she said, adding that the report has been prepared on the basis of a comparison of scanned copies which is not admissible under the law and standard norms of forensic science.
She said that it is an admitted fact that three out of four signatories of trust deeds had appeared before the JIT and confronted the fact of fixation of their signatures. It is further corroborated by the solicitor Freemen Box through his email in response to email of Raja Quist Solicitor and it was also confirmed by Jermy Freemen, she said, adding that as per testimony of Zia, Radely report was available with JIT yet she was not confronted with it when she joined the investigation.
To a question about use of Calibri font which, according to Radley's report was not commercially available in February 2006 when the trust deeds were signed, she said that Radley during his cross-examination admitted that there was a pre-release of Window Vista Beta-1 version, which was available in April 2005, with subsequent versions in September and October 2005 before the commercial launch of Window Vista on January 31, 2007.
She said that Radley further admitted that he himself downloaded and used it. Radley in his testimony said that the creator of Calibri font namely Lucas De Groot had been given an award by the TDC (Type Director Club) Competitions in the year 2005 for the design of the Calibri font.
Maryam said that Radley has no qualification in software of computer science, adding he is not an expert of font identification. "During the course of investigation, Radley proved himself highly interested but totally biased witness," she said.
Maryam also said that her grandfather Mian Muhammad Sharif looked after the entire family and even fixed pocket money for each family member.
The court adjourned hearing till May 28 and Maryam will continue recording her statement. She responded to 82 questions out of the 128 questions till rising of the court.