Pakistan's Nawaz Sharif names brother as successor.

Shahid Khaqan Abbasi to serve as interim PM until Shahbaz Sharif can take over after national assembly election.

Islamabad, Pakistan - Deposed Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has named his younger brother Shahbaz to replace him as the country's leader, after having been removed from office by the Supreme Court a day earlier for lying on a wealth declaration.

Addressing a televised meeting of leaders of his PML-N party in Islamabad on Saturday, the elder Sharif said he accepted the Supreme Court's verdict, but did not agree with it.

Shahbaz Sharif, currently the chief minister of Punjab province, which is Pakistan's most populous region and the Sharif's political heartland, will have to resign from that post and run for a by-election to join Parliament before he is elected as prime minister.

In the interim period, Nawaz Sharif said, party leader Shahid Khaqan Abbasi would serve as the country's prime minister.

"It will take Shahbaz some time to be elected, about 50 days ... so in the interim period … I suggest Shahid Khaqan Abbasi as the candidate," the former prime minister said.

Pakistani President Mamnoon Hussain is due to convene a session of Parliament shortly to elect Abbasi to the post.

Sharif's PML-N party holds a comfortable majority in the lower house of Parliament and the election is expected to pass without much drama.

'I don't understand grounds for dismissal'

Sharif was removed from office on Friday on grounds that he did not declare his role in a company based in the United Arab Emirates, from which he was paid a salary, in a 2013 wealth declaration made before running for Parliament.

Sharif dismissed the allegations against him as minor, adding that no corruption charges had yet been proven against him.

"I still do not understand the grounds for my dismissal," he said. "I am only content that I was not disqualified on the grounds of alleged corruption."

Sharif contends that he never withdrew that salary and was therefore not liable to declare it.

"When I never took a salary, what would I declare?" asked Sharif at the meeting on Saturday. "When you take something, there's a problem; when you don't, there's a problem."

'Panama Papers'

Friday's landmark ruling followed months of hearings sparked by the leak of the Panama Papers, which showed that three of Sharif's children were connected to three offshore companies registered in the British Virgin Islands.

Those companies, the documents showed, had been involved in the mortgage of four apartments in London's posh Park Lane neighbourhood. Sharif's political opponents had been alleging for years that the properties had been obtained through ill-gotten gains made during Sharif's previous two terms in power in the 1990s.

The Sharif family has denied any wrongdoing, saying the apartments were bought using proceeds from the sale of a steel mill in the UAE.

The Supreme Court, having constituted a high-level investigative panel to probe the allegations, concluded on Friday that there was enough evidence to refer Sharif, his three children and Finance Minister Ishaq Dar to a corruption trial court.

No democratically elected prime minister in Pakistan's history has completed the five-year term in office.

Sharif himself has been removed twice before from power. In 1993, he was removed after a bitter struggle with the country's president, and in 1999 the military overthrew him in a bloodless coup.

Other prime ministers have been removed through votes of no-confidence in Parliament, the dissolution of the assemblies by the military or in direct military coups.

Pakistan's military has ruled the country for roughly half of its 70-year history.

Panama Papers leak sparked probe that led to Pakistan leader's resignation.

Revelations of his family's finances that emerged in the Panama Papers leak led to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's resignation Friday after the country's Supreme Court disqualified him in a corruption probe.

The high court ruled that Sharif had been dishonest to Parliament and to the judicial system and was no longer deemed fit for office.

A five-judge panel announced its unanimous decision Friday afternoon. Silence enveloped the courtroom as Justice Ejaz Afzal read the judgment, and the opposition distributed candy in celebration following the verdict.

Scandal first ignited with the release of the Panama Papers in April 2016.

Pakistan Supreme Court disqualifies Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif from office.

The panel investigated Sharif's alleged links to offshore accounts and overseas properties owned by three of his adult children. The assets were not declared on his family's wealth statement, but the Panama Papers leak in April 2016 revealed them. The huge cache of documents allegedly connected to a Panama law firm revealed the financial dealings of some of the world's best-known people.

Sharif was not named in the Panama Papers, but his three children were linked in the documents to offshore companies.

The Panama Papers leak sparked mass protests in Pakistan and calls from opposition political groups for a panel to investigate Sharif and his children over their alleged offshore accounts.

Opposition: 'Victory for the people'

Reacting to the verdict, the ruling party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, or PML-N, said the Prime Minister would accept the court's decision.

"There has been an injustice against us. Nawaz Sharif will step down as premier of Pakistan despite reservations regarding the verdict," a party statement said.

The election commission was ordered to issue a disqualification notice to Sharif. With the ruling, his Cabinet also was dissolved.

The 68-year-old leader who has been at the helm of Pakistan's turbulent politics for more than three decades was expected to vacate the Prime Minister's residence by Friday evening.

Former cricket star Imran Khan, leader of the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, or PTI, lobbied vigorously for Sharif's investigation and described the court's decision as a "victory for the people."

"Nations are not destroyed by wars, bombs or natural disasters. They are destroyed when their institutions have been destroyed," Khan said. "This is the beginning. Now all of us have to protect our resources and not let the corrupt exploit them."

But Pakistan's minister of railways blamed the military for Sharif's downfall.

"There has been an injustice against us," said the minister, Khawaja Saad Rafique, who is a member of Sharif's party. "We are very aware what the actual crime of the PM is. We want civil supremacy.

We come into power through democratic means. We give our lives to bring back democracy to this country. We give power to these institutions. ... We are being punished for this."

No civilian prime minister in Pakistan has ever completed a full term in office. Friday's ruling marked the first time in the country's history that a leader was disqualified from office following a judicial process.

Sharif's term was to end next year, and he wouldn't have been able to run again because of term limits.

But with the disqualification, he can't hold any parliamentary position, become involved in election campaigns or lead his party.

General elections are scheduled for April, and the ruling PML-N is widely expected to win despite Friday's ruling.

A prominent Pakistani journalist said Sharif's resignation will "activate the streets."

"I think they are feeling that if a person with the experience of Nawaz Sharif can be ousted then, nobody will else will be allowed to 'deliver' until the elections," Nusrat Javed said. "There is a feeling that the judges have played someone else's game. It all depends on who the next prime minister will be."

A political heavyweight

Under Sharif, Pakistan has experienced economic growth and a marked drop in terrorism. The government also has initiated a bold foreign policy that led to strong ties with China and the formation of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.

Known as the "Lion of Punjab," Sharif is one of Pakistan's leading industrialists and richest men as well as a fearsome political operative -- having been Prime Minister twice before.

But his long political career has been dogged with missteps and allegations of corruption. He was forced to step down during his first term as Prime Minister after a family-owned business, Ittefaq Industries, grew tremendously while he was in office.

Sharif was re-elected in 1997 and ordered Pakistan's first nuclear tests, but a showdown with the nation's powerful military saw his second term end prematurely as well.

In 1999, Sharif fired then-army head Pervez Musharraf after a failed invasion of Kargil in Indian-controlled Kashmir. But in a dramatic turnaround, Musharraf launched a coup and eventually had his former boss imprisoned on charges of hijacking for attempting to stop a plane carrying the general from landing.

Sharif was later sentenced to an additional 14 years in prison on corruption charges, but he was released after six months when Saudi Arabia brokered a deal to allow him to go into exile there.

In 2007, Sharif returned to his homeland after his PML-N party teamed up with the Pakistan Peoples Party, or PPP, to force Musharraf out of office.

After some legal and constitutional wrangling, Sharif was re-elected Prime Minister for a third time in 2013 amid accusations of vote-rigging.

Musharraf praised the court's decision and said he believed Sharif's political career was finished.

Links to offshore companies alleged

The latest and final nail in Sharif's political coffin is not of his own making but rather the alleged financial improprieties of his children.

While owning properties is not illegal, opposition parties have questioned if the money to buy them came from public funds.

Sharif was not personally named, but three adult children were linked to offshore companies that owned properties in London. One British Virgin Islands holding firm listed his daughter, Maryam, as the sole shareholder.

The Supreme Court created a task force in April after it was unable to determine the links to corruption independently. At the time Sharif pledged to step down if anything from the investigation proved corruption.

Investigators found that Sharif held a work permit for the United Arab Emirates for a previously undisclosed company, a violation of the Pakistani Constitution, according to Friday's judgment.

In November, his daughter tweeted images of a disclosure form claiming she was not the owner of a London property. However, the document, dated 2006, used a font -- Calibri -- that did not become widely available until the following year.

Maryam Sharif, who many believed was being groomed to take the reins from her father, has denied any wrongdoing.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Nawaz Sharif, the tycoon and party leader who helped define a turbulent era of Pakistani politics, stepped down as prime minister on Friday after the Supreme Court ruled that corruption allegations had disqualified him.

Coming with less than a year to go in his term, his ouster adds to a grim and long list of civilian governments cut short in Pakistan — including two of his own previous terms as prime minister. And it will further roil the country’s tumultuous political balance, as his rivals vie to exploit his fall.

When Mr. Sharif returned to office in 2013, it was as a widely popular party leader with a deep grudge against the country’s powerful military establishment. He moved quickly to try to establish civilian authority in areas that had long been dominated by generals, especially foreign policy.

But Mr. Sharif, 67, is exiting with none of those ambitions realized.
The Pakistani military has seldom been able to wield as potent a mix of policy control and popular acclaim as it does now. The fragile democratic system in this nuclear-armed nation of almost 200 million people again appears to be on shaky ground. And Mr. Sharif’s own political legacy stands further tarnished.

The governing political party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, must now choose an interim prime minister to replace Mr. Sharif until the next general election, which is scheduled for mid-2018.
The charges against Mr. Sharif and three of his children — two sons and a daughter — stemmed from disclosures last year in the Panama Papers leak. Those documents revealed that the children owned expensive residential property in London through offshore companies.

The justices, drawing on a constitutional article that allows the courts to disqualify a member of Parliament who is found to be dishonest, said that they were acting because Mr. Sharif had tried to conceal his assets. And they ordered the opening of a criminal investigation into the Sharif family.

Watching the courtroom drama was the country’s powerful military, which has traditionally decided the fate of civilian governments. There had been hushed speculation that the court, in coming to its decision, had the tacit, if not overt, backing of powerful generals.

Now, Imran Khan, the opposition politician who has been spearheading the campaign against Mr. Sharif since he took power in 2013, stands to gain the most politically from the prime minister’s removal. Mr. Khan has doggedly and almost obsessively led the charge against Mr. Sharif and rallied much of the public against him through a mix of street agitation and court petitions.

The Supreme Court had asked the members of the Sharif family to provide a paper trail of the money they used to buy their London apartments. Investigators found that they were “living beyond their means.”

Despite repeated court exhortations, Mr. Sharif’s family and its lawyers failed to provide satisfactory documentation, the justices said. Several of the documents they produced were declared fake or insufficient.
A representative of the governing party said that although Mr. Sharif was stepping down, the party had “strong reservations” about the verdict and was contemplating “all legal and constitutional means” to challenge it.

Mr. Sharif has called the inquiry into his family’s finances a conspiracy and has asserted that in his three terms as prime minister he had not been tarred by a major corruption scandal.
The ruling, while expected, leaves undecided the long-term fate of the man who has been a dominating force in Pakistani politics for the better part of three decades.

“I did not expect Nawaz Sharif to go scot-free,” said Hasan Askari Rizvi, a prominent political analyst who is based in Lahore.
“If he has a long-term vision, he will sit back and guide his political party,” Mr. Rizvi added. “He and his supporters will portray the court verdict as victimization and a grave conspiracy involving international powers.”

Mr. Sharif’s removal from office throws his political succession plans into disarray. His daughter Maryam Nawaz Sharif, 43, who was being groomed as his political heir, was also implicated in the case.
Political insiders say there are several possible contenders to replace Mr. Sharif as prime minister in the immediate interim. Names being discussed as include Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, the speaker of the national assembly; Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, the minister of petroleum; Khurram Dastgir Khan, the commerce minister; and Khawaja Muhammad Asif, the defense minister.

“Whoever they bring will be a weak prime minister, as Nawaz Sharif would want to have someone who is more or less in line with his thinking,” Mr. Rizvi said.

For a long-term replacement, though, speculation is focusing on Mr. Sharif’s brother Shehbaz, 65, who is the chief minister of Punjab Province and a prominent and divisive political figure in his own right. He would first have to take his brother’s Parliament seat in a spot election.
Political analysts say the verdict hands Mr. Khan an undeniable political and moral victory, because it was his pressure on the court to take up the Panama Papers case and then render a quick verdict that forced some of the action.

“Imran Khan will be strengthened, but it remains to be seen how he capitalizes in Punjab Province, which is critical to winning the general elections,” Mr. Rizvi said. Punjab, the most populous and prosperous of the country’s four provinces, has been a stronghold of Mr. Sharif’s for decades.

Mr. Sharif presided over a period of relative economic stability and was able to complete a few large infrastructure projects while reducing the crippling power outages that have long afflicted Pakistan.
But the stubborn scandal over the London real estate holdings sullied the reputation of his family.

Mr. Sharif’s political party nonetheless hopes that his achievements can bring it another electoral success next year even if Mr. Sharif cannot run for office.

“We will make a comeback,” Khawaja Saad Rafique, a party leader, said Friday afternoon at a news conference flanked by other senior figures. He said Mr. Sharif’s “crime was that he stood for civilian supremacy.”

He urged party workers to remain peaceful and said that the party respects the country’s institutions. “There will be no chaos,’’ he said. “We will move forward with wisdom and not emotion.”

During his most recent tenure, Mr. Sharif had an uneven relationship with the military. His overtures of more openness toward India, Pakistan’s longtime foe, backfired as generals spurned his efforts.

More recently, relations with the military took a darker turn after news reports detailed how civilian officials confronted the military over what they called a failure to act against Islamist groups. Mr. Sharif had to fire his information minister and two top aides to placate the army.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party, said the Panama Papers ruling was “a real test of our system.”
Some predicted a politically volatile time ahead.

“Until the elections, this will lead to a period of political instability,” Amber Rahim Shamsi, a prominent journalist who hosts a show on Dawn TV, said of the verdict.

“The Sharif political dynasty has somehow managed to survive Pakistan’s rough and bloody politics for over three and a half decades through wheeling and dealing,” Ms. Shamsi said. “It is hard to imagine all the family falling like a pack of cards. Nawaz Sharif has a following and could cash in on political martyrdom to stage a comeback.”

IN AND OUT OF POWER IN PAKISTAN

Nawaz Sharif served as prime minister an unprecedented three times. All his terms were cut short. Here’s how they played out.

First termIn 1990, Mr. Sharif was ushered into power as head of the Pakistan Muslim League. As his business grew, suspicions of corruption surfaced. He was dismissed by President Ghulam Ishaq Khan in 1993. The Supreme Court eventually deemed his dismissal unconstitutional, but Mr. Sharif resigned under pressure from Pakistan’s powerful military.
Second termMr. Sharif was elected again in 1997. Two years later, a military coup ended his term after he fired the army chief, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, and then, according to reports, kept the general’s return flight to Pakistan from landing. Troops loyal to Gen. Musharraf seized the Karachi airport and overthrew the prime minister. Mr. Sharif was tried and found guilty of hijacking and terrorism and sentenced to life in prison.
Third term After spending seven years in exile in a deal brokered by the Saudi royal family, Mr. Sharif returned to Pakistan in 2007. He was cleared of criminal charges and deemed eligible to run for office. Mr. Sharif was again elected prime minister in 2013, but he was met with opposition and faced large protests in 2014. He was tried on corruption charges after the 2016 Panama Papers revealed that his children owned expensive homes in London through a string of offshore companies.