A British building contractor is suing Zardari's friend Javaid Pasha (chairman of the London based TV-Asia) for non-payment of bills worth 375,000 pounds for work done on Rockwood House in Surrey. He told The Guardian newspaper that he was brought in to do the work by Pasha and his wife Shabnam for whom he had worked before. He said that while the Pashas were coordinating the renovation, he was in no doubt that the property was Zardari's.

Paul Keating has kept minutes of meetings, invoices, photographs and architects' drawings. He said that Pasha told him he could not tellanyone who the house was for but that Zardari's own indiscretion led to the revelations. He said: ``Unfortunately word soon got out, mainly because of Mr Zardari himself. He went to the local pub in Brook, the Dog and Pheasant, and offered to buy the place. When he was told it wasn't for sale, we had to build a replica of the bar in the basement of Rockwood House. I would say Mr Zardari was not the subtlest of men.''

Keating said that he met Zardari on more than one occasion. ``I was never in any doubt that Rockwood was his property or that he intended to move in at some stage...Mr Zardari made that quite clear. I think he intended the house to be their family home. The plan went wrong when he was arrested for corruption.''

According to Keating, Zardari stayed overnight at the Rockwood Estate on at least one occasion, and spoke of readying the house for ``BB.'' Keating said that Zardari was very much in charge, ``approving designs and visiting the estate to make sure the work was going according toschedule.'' He said that in April 1996, he met Zardari in a London hotel to discuss the building work. ``Then we drove down to Surrey in a limousine. He did not stay overnight on that occasion, but I must have seen him at Rockwood on three or four occasions. I also have photographs of Mr Zardari meeting one of the architects in Lahore.''

Paul Keating's firm was brought into the project in 1995, after it was purchased by an off-shore firm Romina Properties Ltd. with money from another off-shore company Olton Consolidated Ltd. The work on the house, which cost more than 1.7 million pounds, included plans for a stud, a helipad, a nine-hole golf course, an extension to the indoor swimming pool, and a paddock for the polo ponies.

The master bedroom was reinforced with girders to make it bomb-proof and a 70,000-pound security system was installed. Bathrooms were covered in marble, curtains worth 50,000-pound were made for the bedrooms, and doors on the ground floor were copper-plated.

Keating, according tothe paper, was also involved in the arrangements to receive the crates of artefacts and furniture air-freighted from Pakistan, for the house. He has documents and photographs of the contents, which he has shown The Guardian, which show that crates weighing 7.5 tonnes and containing furniture and other valuables were delivered to Rockwood House, after arriving at Heathrow in February and March 1996.

The crates contained 19 bundles of carpets, 14 antique rifles, 16 oil paintings, wood carvings, a stuffed tiger and furniture, including a 30-foot Italian cut glass table. In October 1996, Javaid Pasha called Keating and ordered him to pack the furniture and artefacts because ``they weren't needed in the house anymore.'' Keating was told to take some of the things to the Pakistan High Commission and to make sure that he was not followed. He said: ``Javaid was worried that the couple's political enemies were watching the house day and night.''

According to Keating, the bulk of the goods were taken in trucks toa number of other destinations. Some things, like the Italian table and two seven-foot-long carvings were too big to be moved at short notice, and are still at the property. Keating said that the work on the site was stopped abruptly a month before Bhutto's government was dismissed and payments for the building work stopped after the dismissal. Javaid Pasha asked him to sign a ``confidentiality agreement'' after the government fell and told him to destroy all the documents he had. Keating said: ``I said I would but only when I was paid for the remainder of the work. I still haven't been paid. I have kept quiet hoping to settle this amicably.''

Javaid Pasha says he has had business dealings with Paul Keating but denies anything to do with the Rockwood estate. He told The Guardian: ``I can't help you. I have never been to Rockwood House. I don't know where it is. I have read about it in the newspapers: that's all. I didn't have anything to do with it at all.''

Benazir Bhutto also continued to maintainignorance on the subject. She said: ``I have never even been to Surrey. I don't know anything about this house. I have been told by people for a long time that my husband bought the house. I have asked my husband on 10 occasions if this is true and he said it is not. I have never seen the paperwork to prove it. I do not believe he had anything to do with it.''

The case begins on Friday.