ISLAMABAD: General (retd) Pervez Musharraf whose billions in offshore accounts were unearthed by The News and who consumes millions of rupees from the public kitty for his security and is presently enjoying free treatment at the cost of taxpayers’ money and always talks about “Pakistan first”, does not pay even a single penny as tax.
According to sources, Musharraf, who had a successful but dubious journey from rags to riches, did not pay any tax for the last at least four years. Instead, while violating the law of the land, he did not even bother to file his income tax return for the year 2013.
Though the sources claim that Musharraf has even concealed his offshore wealth from the tax authorities, in his nomination papers filed for the May 2013 elections he declared the total value of his assets at Rs645 million. However, this amount is far less than the amount shown in his offshore accounts by The News in 2012.
Musharraf’s National Tax Number (NTN) is 00187208. For the 2013 tax assessment year ending June 30, Musharraf neither filed his return electronically nor manually although under the law he was supposed to do it electronically.
These sources said that Musharraf did not pay any tax this year. In the assessment year 2012, he declared Rs1,567,000 as his total income but paid no tax. In the 2011 assessment year, he declared Rs1,467,420 as his income but paid no tax. In the year 2010, he declared Rs1,386,168 as his income but paid no tax.
Previously, while in service Musharraf, through at-source deduction of his salary, used to contribute a meager amount as income tax.In his ECP nomination papers, Musharraf confirmed that he did not pay even a single penny as tax during the last three years — 2010, 2011 and 2012. In his nomination papers he had declared the then value of his assets as Rs645,011,465.
He declared that his net assets, as compared to the preceding year, had increased by Rs129,002,293 from previous year’s total wealth of Rs516,009,172. Despite this huge increase of 129 million rupees, he neither paid any tax nor showed how he earned so much money. His FBR record, as presented to the ECP, however, showed that his total income was a mere Rs1.5 million.
The man, who costs in millions every month to the national exchequer, never informed the tax authorities about his billions. The tax officials also never sought any explanation from him as to how he managed to earn billions without paying any tax to the government.
It is relevant to mention here that there is no indication who has been funding him and how he became fabulously rich but the retired general has accumulated billions in offshore accounts besides the property that he has already purchased in foreign lands or in Pakistan.
It was revealed by The News in one of its investigative stories that Musharraf had at least seven to 10 offshore accounts in Dubai and London containing huge cash in dollars, pounds and dirhams.
In his book “In the Line of Fire” Musharraf admitted that he had come from a really humble background where they did not have enough money but now he pays at least half a million rupees as monthly salary to his personal staff residing in Pakistan.
Besides having foreign bank accounts, Musharraf had made huge saving investments abroad to earn large profits. In just one Dubai-based online trading service — MMA — Musharraf had US$1,600,000 (Rs145 million) a few years back. Musharraf’s account number was AV77777. In the Union National Bank, which is an investment bank in Abu Dhabi, Musharraf and his spouse Sehba Musharraf, had a joint account No 4002000304, in which the amount as reported by The News was almost UAE Dirhams 17,000,000 (Rs391 million). In the same bank — the Union National Bank — the couple had another joint account No400200315, which was a dollar account. This particular account last year contained US$535,325 (Rs48 million).
In yet another UAE Dirham account in the same financial institution — the Union National Bank — Sehba and Musharraf had almost UAE Dirhams 7,600,000 (Rs174 million) last year. The account No was 4003006700. In the fourth account, No 4003006711, in the Union National Bank, they had UAE Dirhams 8,000,000 (Rs184 million). In the fifth account, No 4003006722 in the same bank Musharraf and his wife had US$8,000,000 (Rs728 million). In the sixth account, No 4003006733, Mrs Sehba Musharraf and Mr Pervez Musharraf had UAE Dirhams 8,000,000 (Rs184 million) last year. In the seventh account, No 4003006744, in the same bank, the couple was holding UAE Dirhams 8,000,000 (Rs184 million). In their eighth account in the same bank, they had US$1,300,000 (Rs118 million).
During the initial few months of his taking over as military dictator following his coup against the Nawaz Sharif government, General Musharraf did make his wealth public, which hardly contained any cash but only some plots in different parts of the country.Musharraf claims to be Mr Clean of Pakistan. Via: TheNews
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