ISLAMABAD: Former Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf appeared before the accountability court here on Friday as a principal accused in the Rs22 billion Rental Power Projects (RPPs) reference.

He, however, requested the court not to frame charges against him till the final decision on two stay orders granted by the Lahore High Court (LHC) to the two other accused in the case.

Farooq Naek, the counsel for the former prime minister, pleaded before the court that no corruption had been provedagainst his client. Therefore, he should be acquitted.

Mr Ashraf claimed that he himself wanted to bring the RPPs issue to the court so that the facts of the case could be put before the public.

On this, the court ordered the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to exclude, by Jan 17, names of those persons who had been cleared in the investigation of the case.

The court asked those who had been found innocent in the investigation to formally submit applications for removal of their names from the case.

Later, talking to reporters after the court proceedings, Mr Naek said that NAB could not find any evidence of corruption against Mr Ashraf.

He said corruption of Rs7.5 million was found in the shipment of Naudero Power Plant which had nothing to do with the former prime minister.

NAB filed a supplementary reference inNaudero-II rental power project in the court on Nov 7, and it is expected that Mr Ashraf will have to face eight more such charges under the RPPs scam as four references have already been prepared and are ready to be filed in the court.

Beside this, the bureau is working on four other such references.

`All five references prepared by NAB Rawalpindi carry names of former Prime Minister Ashraf. They include Naudero-II Power Project, Piraghaib Power Project, Sahuwal Power Project and Karkey,` a senior official of the authority told Dawn.

The executive management board of NAB had approved filing of references against Mr Ashraf, Iqbal Z. Ahmed (owner of the power plant) and M.N. Baig on November 1.

Iqbal Z. Ahmed and M.N. Baig had, on Nov 4 obtained a stay order against NAB proceedings and did not appear before the court.Former prime minister`s name has been placed on the Exit Control List (ECL).

A senior official of the NAB told Dawn that Mr Ashraf had been accused of obtaining kickbacks and commissions from nine rental power firms for awarding them contracts to set up their projects in 2008 to overcome electricity crisis in the country.

Quoting from the 263-page reference, he said the former prime minister had also been accused of preparing and submitting a misleading summary before the federal cabinet pleading for increase of mobilisation advance of nine rental power companies from 7 to 14 per cent. This was approved and authorised for submission to the ECC on August 17, 2009.

Mr Ashraf served as prime minister for nine months in the last PPP government from June 22, 2012 to March 16, 2013. He was made prime minister after ouster of his predecessor Yousuf Raza Gilani on the orders of the Supreme Court.