PHF confirms receiving NAB letter on human trafficking racket

The Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) has confirmed that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had written to it about allegations of some hockey people being involved in a human trafficking racket while taking teams abroad.
PHF secretary Shahbaz Ahmed made the disclosure after one of the suspects in the human trafficking racket, Neelma Hussain, sent a legal notice to the federation for bringing disrepute to her family by naming her in the scandal.
Neelma, a former hockey player, told the media the legal notice was served on the PHF for levelling serious allegations against her and her husband, Aamir Salman Bernard, who runs a local club called Islamabad Tigers, which has been banned by the PHF.

The husband and wife are suspected of being involved in a racket which also involves some former international players. They would obtain invitations for local tournaments in Europe and middle eastern countries and then seek visas for their hand-picked players and officials to represent their club in the selected events abroad.
Foreign missions in Pakistan have also informed the PHF about some people going with the team abroad and not returning home.
Shahbaz is also alleged to have close ties with them and the PHF is under scrutiny over whether it was aware of the illegal activities and if it issued recommendation and approval letters to be shown at foreign missions to secure visas.

Responding to the legal notice, Shahbaz, one of Pakistan's greatest players, said the PHF had made no allegations against anyone.

Shahbaz said that the federation had received a letter from NAB in which human smuggling matter was mentioned and the name of the husband and wife was also mentioned.
"Obviously since the NAB wrote to us we took notice of the matter and intimated all our affiliated units about it but we made no allegations of human trafficking against anyone," he said.
Shahbaz said that Sports Minister Riaz Pirzada had also spoken to the PHF about the NAB letter and asked them to take serious note of it and cooperate in any inquiry.

Shahbaz said the matter was serious and the PHF has, for the time being, banned the Tiger club and the Islamabad Hockey Association.
Shahbaz said the PHF was informed that NAB took action based on a complaint filed by a former hockey player and organiser, Bilal Shabbir, who has made the human trafficking allegations against the husband and wife.
Neelma told the media that her husband's club never sought any NOC from the PHF to take any team abroad nor was any person smuggled with the team abroad.