Nawaz Sharif says he had spent more time in exile than as the country’s prime minister

LAHORE, Dec 18 (SABAH): Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Quaid and former prime minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif on Monday said he had spent more time in exile than as the country’s prime minister – a reference to the fact that his governments were dismissed thrice prematurely and he was sent abroad twice.

Again calling for fixing the responsibility and holding them accountable for his removal from office in 2017, Nawaz Sharif said the only purpose to get him sentenced through fake cases and a manipulated process was to install a “selected government” [of PTI’s former chairman].

Nawaz Sharif was addressing a meeting of the PML-N parliamentary board which interviewed the candidates aspiring for tickets to contest the February 8 elections from Sindh for national and provincial assemblies through his party’s platform.

Those acting against the Constitution must face punishment, Nawaz Sharif said about his rivals who not only toppled his governments but also acted in violation of their respective oath in different capacities.

“We have never violated the Constitution and law. We have always followed protected the constitution,” he remarked, adding that those believing in the Constitution and law were eliminated to fulfil the nefarious designs.

Nawaz Sharif said he was an elected prime minister but ousted in 1999 after being declared as a hijacker and for not receiving salary from his son on the basis of Black Law Dictionary which had no room or justification under Pakistan’s law.

Someone should have had asked the question how a person, who was a prime minister in the morning, turned a hijacker by night, Nawaz Sharif said.

The three-time prime minister, who is now eyeing a record fourth term in office getting his sentences quashed through due judicial process, said some people had committed great excesses against the country and damaged it – using the word “we” for “people” in first person in his traditional style of addressing others.

Nawaz Sharif wondered that the [PTI] government installed after crashing the RTS on July 25, 2018 was unable to construct one single [section of] motorway from Sukkur to Hyderabad.

While listing the achievements of his government, he said millions of people were getting out of the poverty each year, but everything had reversed since then.

Nawaz Sharif mentioned that they had even repaid loan received from China and the things would have been totally different if the momentum wasn’t lost.

Nawaz Sharif remarked that they were neither ever involved in cattle theft nor had even thought about it – pointing to the practice of registering fake cases for stealing buffaloes and others to target the critics, a crime which is considered very serious in a society based upon agriculture economy.

He and his associates had been nominated in bogus cases, the PML-N supremo said and cited Rana Sanaullah Khan as an example for being booked and jailed on the charges transporting heroin – a crime that carries death sentence. Nawaz Sharif, however, noted that the judges had thrown out all the fabricated cases.

PML-N President and former prime minister Mian Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif, PML-N Senior Vice President and Party’s Chief Organizer Maryam Nawaz Sharif, PML-N Punjab President and former interior minister Rana Sanaullah Khan, PML-N Finance Secretary and former minister for finance and revenue Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar, PML-N Secretary General and former minister for planning, development and special initiatives Ahsan Iqbal Chaudhry, PML-N Sindh President Bashir Ahmed Memon, PML-N Vice President Shah Muhammad Shah, Khwajwa Muhammad Saad Rafique, Captain (retd) Muhammad Safdar, Parvez Rashid, PML-N, Spokesperson Marriyum Aurangzeb and other leaders were also present on the occasion.