New family company is legitimate, says MP Nadhim Zahawi

Stratford MP Nadhim Zahawi came under pressure this week to explain the purpose of a limited company set up by his family.

Zahawi Warren Ltd was registered with Companies House on 10th June, but changed its name a day later to Warren Medical Ltd.

The directors of the company are Zahawi’s wife, Lana Saib, 54, and twin sons, Ahmad and Jaafar Shanshal, 23.

Between them the three family members are also directors of Zahawi Properties Ltd, Zahawi Brierley Ltd and Zahawi Wantage Ltd.

All the business are connected to the property sector, and the nature of Warren Medical is described as ‘other letting and operating of owned or leased real estate’.

The inclusion of the word ‘medical’ in the new company’s name caused a slew of speculation across social media platforms this week that it sounded inappropriate given Mr Zahawi’s position as vaccine minister.

When the Herald put this to his office, a spokesperson for the Department for Health and Social Care responded: “There is no conflict of interest. This company has never been active and has never made a financial transaction, and any suggestion of wrongdoing is misleading and categorically false.”

They added: “In his role as vaccines minister, Mr Zahawi is overseeing the successful deployment of two vaccines across the country.”

When pressed neither Mr Zahawi or DHSC would respond to further questions.

However, Mr Zahawi did offer further clarification when being interviewed on LBC radio this week, he explained it was intended for a property deal which never came to pass and was fully declared to the Business department, where he was a minister at the time.

“I can tell you very precisely that my wife had looked at a project, a property project to invest in a brain injury rehabilitation centre as a property investment,” he said, and then added that the project had not gone ahead in the end.