Pakistani financial bigwig Arif Naqvi, currently confined to his UK home on bail, financed Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf through exhibition matches at his country estate in the Oxfordshire village of England, reported the Financial Times on Friday.

The report by Simon Clark cites financial documents to substantiate the claim.

Naqvi, who founded the Dubai-based Abraaj Group, hosted the “Wootton T20 Cup” between 2010 and 2012. Cricketer-turned-politician Imran was among those who attended the fundraiser and was even persuaded to take the field, according to English commentator Henry Blofeld who attended the event.

This happened before the 2013 elections in which Imran Khan was a contender.

“You can choose to play in order to impress or make a fool of yourself, or alternatively just to be an innocent bystander,” Naqvi wrote in the invitation to the event. Guests were asked to pay between £2,000 and £2,500 each to attend, with the money going to unspecified “philanthropic causes”, he said.

The London-based daily’s report says that the event was the type of charity fundraiser and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf was the ultimate benefactor. It added that fees were paid to Wootton Cricket Ltd, a company owned by Naqvi, that was used to financially support PTI.

“Funds poured into Wootton Cricket from companies and individuals, including at least £2 million from a United Arab Emirates government minister who is also a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family,” it said.

The report comes at a time when the coalition government is putting pressure on the Election Commission of Pakistan to announce its decision in the prohibited funding case against PTI.

The ECP’s scrutiny committee in January issued a damning report in which it said the PTI received funding from foreign nationals and companies. It accused the former ruling party of under-reporting funds and concealing dozens of bank accounts.

“Abraaj emails and internal documents seen by the Financial Times, including a bank statement covering the period between February 28 and May 30, 2013, for a Wootton Cricket account in the UAE, show that both companies and foreign nationals, as well as citizens of Pakistan, sent millions of dollars to Wootton Cricket — before money was transferred from the account to Pakistan for the PTI,” said the newspaper.

“Wootton Cricket’s bank statement showed the PTI received $1.3 million on March 14, 2013, from Abraaj Investment Management Ltd, the fund management unit of Naqvi’s private equity firm, boosting the account’s previous balance of $5,431. Later the same day, $1.3 million was transferred from the account directly to a PTI bank account in Pakistan.”

It claimed that Abraaj expensed the cost to a holding company through which it controlled K-Electric, the power provider to Karachi.

“A further $2 million flowed into the Wootton Cricket account in April 2013 from Sheikh Nahyan bin Mubarak al-Nahyan, a member of Abu Dhabi’s royal family, government minister and chair of Pakistan’s Bank Alfalah,” according to the bank statement and a copy of the Swift transfer details.

Naqvi, 62, then exchanged emails with a colleague about transferring $1.2 million more to the PTI. Six days after the $2 million arrived in the Wootton Cricket bank account, Naqvi transferred $1.2 million from it to Pakistan in two instalments. It quoted Rafique Lakhani, a senior Abraaj executive responsible for managing cash flow, saying in an email to Naqvi that the transfers were intended for the PTI.

“Like other populists, Khan is made of Teflon,” Uzair Younus, director of the Pakistan initiative at the Washington-based Atlantic Council, told the Financial Times.

The election commission in its January report said that Wootton Cricket had transferred $2.12 million to the PTI but didn’t reveal the original source of the money. Naqvi has acknowledged his ownership of Wootton Cricket and denied any wrongdoing.

The bank statement for Wootton Cricket showed that Naqvi transferred three instalments directly to the PTI in 2013 adding up to a total of $2.12mn. The largest was the $1.3 million from Abraaj which company documents show was transferred to Wootton Cricket but charged to its holding company for K-Electric.

K-Electric was Abraaj’s single largest investment. But in 2016, Naqvi struck a deal to sell control of the power company to the Shanghai Electric Power for $1.77 billion as power company ran into financial difficulties. “Political approval for the deal in Pakistan was important and Naqvi lobbied the governments of both Sharif and Khan for backing. In 2016, he authorised a $20 million payment for Pakistan politicians to gain their support, according to US public prosecutors who later charged him with fraud, theft and attempted bribery.”

The payment was allegedly intended for Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shehbaz Sharif. The brothers have denied any knowledge of the matter. In January 2017, Naqvi hosted a dinner for Nawaz Sharif at Davos.

Abraaj collapsed in 2018 after investors including the Gates Foundation started investigating whether the company was misusing money in a fund intended to buy and build hospitals across Africa and Asia. “In 2019, US prosecutors indicted Naqvi and five of his former colleagues. Two former Abraaj executives have since pleaded guilty. Naqvi denies the charges.”

Naqvi was arrested at London’s Heathrow airport in April 2019 after returning from Pakistan and faces up to 291 years in jail if found guilty of the US charges. Imran’s telephone number was included on a list of contacts he handed to police – a fact mentioned by lawyers representing the US government during Naqvi’s extradition trial in London.

Aaj Digital spoke to Simon Clark about the article in a conversation that was broadcast live on the Aaj News Facebook page.