PESHAWAR: An accountability court on Friday remanded Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Minerals Development Ziaullah Afridi on a 13-day physical remand in the custody of the Ehtesab Commission.
Mr Afridi, who is a leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and MPA from Peshawar, was taken into custody from his residence on Thursday by personnel of the commission which was set up last year by the provincial government through the KPEC Act.
The minister is accused of misusing authority and allowing illegal mining in various areas and making illegal assets. Following Afridi’s arrest on Thursday, PTI Chairman Imran Khan had said that the party’s provincial minister for mines and minerals will have to resign from his post till he clears himself.
Meanwhile the accountability court remanded Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s former mineral minister Mehmood Zeb and nine others, who were arrested over the illegal allotment of government reservoirs of phosphate in the province, in the custody of the National Accountability Bureau for 12 days.