Imran Khan, Nawaz Sharif, Benazir Bhutto and more: When former Pakistan prime ministers were arrested

In Pakistan, becoming a prime minister does not shield you in the future. The latest case in point is the arrest of former Pakistan PM Imran Khan.

Khan was arrested on Tuesday from outside the Islamabad high court, where he had arrived to attend a hearing in two separate cases. According to Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), he was undergoing a biometric process at the court when paramilitary forces broke open the glass window and arrested him after beating lawyers and Khan’s security staff.

While Imran Khan faces more than 120 cases, including inciting violence and treason, his arrest has come in the Al-Qadir Trust case. The trust was reportedly a front for Khan to receive valuable land as a bribe from a real estate developer, Malik Riaz Hussain, who is one of Pakistan’s richest and most powerful businessmen.

Also read: The Fall of Imran Khan: What finally led to arrest of former Pakistani prime minister?

The PTI leader, however, is not the first former PM to be arrested. Pakistan has a long history of incarcerating those who have held the top job – for corruption and for taking on the powerful military. We take a look.

Shehbaz Sharif

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who has been critical of Khan, has also been arrested in the past. He was taken into custody on 28 September 2020 after the Lahore high court rejected his bail in a money laundering case.

The case filed by Pakistan’s anti-corruption agency National Accountability Bureau (NAB) alleged that Shehbaz Sharif and his family members were involved in money laundering and illegal transfer of funds through fake accounts.

The premier was released from Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat central jail nearly seven months after the arrest.

However, Sharif and his son were given a clean shit by the anti-graft agency on Wednesday.

Also read: How Imran Khan crossed a line with Pakistan’s military and was finally arrested

Shahid Khaqan Abbasi

Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) leader Shahid Khaqan Abbasi was the prime minister of Pakistan from January 2017 to May 2018.

On 18 July 2019, he was arrested in a multi-billion-rupee case related to the award of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import contract. The case dates back to a contract from 2013 when Abbasi was the minister for petroleum and natural resources, according to a report in Dawn.

Abbasi was arrested as part of then-PM Imran Khan’s “accountability” drive. However, the PML(N) leader was granted bail and released from Rawalpndi’s Adiala Jail on 27 February 2020.

Nawaz Sharif

In 1999, Nawaz Sharif was cast into exile by Pakistan army chief General Pervez Musharaff. In return, he avoided a life sentence on hijacking and corruption charges.

Sharif returned to Pakistan in September 2007 only to be arrested and sent back to Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah to complete the remaining three years of exile. However, he was released two months later.

Sharif was arrested and jailed on more than one occasion. In July 2018, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison for corruption. The NAB ruled that Sharif and his family laundered money in the 1990s to pay for four luxury apartments in Park Lane, central London, drawing on allegations that resurfaced in the Panama Papers leak. He was released two months later after when the anti-graft court suspended the sentences to wait for a final judgement by a Pakistan high court.

In December 2018, the three-time former PM was jailed for seven years on corruption charges after he was unable to prove the source of income for the ownership of a steel mill in Saudi Arabia, according to Geo News.

A year later, in November, he was allowed to leave the country to receive medical treatment and has not returned to Pakistan since.

Benazir Bhutto

The two-time Pakistan prime minister faced arrest several times.

According to a report in Dawn, Bhutto was put under house arrest for 90 days when she arrived in Pakistan from exile in August 1985 for her brother’s funeral. These were the days of Zia-ul Haq’s dictatorship and Bhutto was the country’s opposition leader.

A year later, in August, she was arrested after denouncing the Zia-ul Haq government at a rally in Karachi on Pakistan independence day. Haq had appointed a civilian government in late 1985 and lifted martial law.

In April 1999, Bhutto was sentenced to five years and disqualified from holding public office on charges of taking kickbacks from a Swiss company hired to fight customs fraud. She was not in the country at the time of the verdict and the conviction was later overturned by a higher court, reports Dawn. In October 1999, non-bailable arrest warrants were re-issued for Bhutto because of her non-appearance in court in the assets reference case.

Benazir Bhutto served as Pakistani prime minister between December 1998 and August 1990 and October 1993 and November 1996. She was assassinated by a suicide bomber in Rawalpindi on 27 December 2007.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto served as prime minister from August 1973 to July 1977. His government was overthrown in a coup by Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.

Bhutto was arrested in September 1977 on charges of conspiracy to murder a political opponent Nawab Kasuri. He was released by the Lahore high court which stated that the arrest had no legal grounds.

However, Haq knew that to stay in power he would have to erase the influence Bhutto wielded. The former PM was arrested again three days later under Martial Law Regulation 12, which empowered law enforcement agencies to arrest a person who was working against security, law and order, or the smooth running of martial law, reports Dawn.

Bhutto was sentenced to death and executed on 4 April 1979.

Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy

Coups have been common in Pakistan. When Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy refused to support Gen Ayub Khan’s coup, he was banned from politics through an Elective Bodies Disqualification Order.

He was arrested in January 1962 and put in solitary confinement in Karachi Central Jail without trial on concocted charges of “anti-state activities” under the 1952 Security of Pakistan Act, reports Dawn.

Suhrawardy was the fifth prime minister of Pakistan, who held office from September 1956 to October 1957.

With inputs from agencies

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