PML-N leadership feels the pain of people who are suffering the brunt of economic challenges: Maryam Nawaz
MULTAN, Feb 05 (SABAH): Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Senior Vice-President and Chief Organiser Maryam Nawaz Sharif has launched a fresh spate of criticism against Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan during the party workers’ convention in Multan.
In her address on Sunday, the PML-N stalwart said the party’s “leadership feels the pain of the people who are suffering the brunt of economic challenges”. “But we all know the reason behind this inflation. The Pakistani nation knows this very well,” Maryam Nawaz said, censuring the previous Imran Khan-led government without taking any names.
Speaking about the injustices meted out to her family — particularly her father and PML-N supremo Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif — Maryam Nawaz said: “Allah and the nation gave the government to Nawaz Sharif thrice. The first time, he was sent home in two-and-a-half years, the second time he was sent home in three years, while the last time he was thrown out of the office within four years [of rule] for not taking a salary from his son. But you all are witness to how Pakistan progressed whenever Nawaz Sharif was in power.”
While talking about the massive rise in inflation, the scion of the Sharif political dynasty said the increase in commodity prices is a result of the agreement that Imran Khan signed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) during his tenure which he later violated.
“Today, the IMF tells us that we will not listen to you because of the way Imran Khan betray us. They insist on increasing the prices and then paying us the loan money. If we listen to the IMF, then inflation goes up, and if we don’t then Pakistan comes to the brink of default.”
Maryam Nawaz went on to say that the “government’s hands are tied due to the IMF agreement”. “We received a desolate Pakistan in 2022. Nawaz Sharif will pull Pakistan out of [desolation] this time, too, as he has always done.”
At the same time, she asked the nation to remain courageous. “It will take time, but we will be out of these challenges.
Taking a dig at Imran Khan with regard to his claim on the Toshakhana gifts, the PML-N chief organiser said: “The watch stealer has not only stolen the watch. In fact, he has wreaked havoc from one corner to another. He fixed his home’s economy and ruined the country’s.”
Taking a jibe at the PTI chairman’s Jail Bharo movement call, she said Imran Khan had been running the Jaib Bharo movement for four years when he was the country’s prime minister.
A day earlier, the PTI chief — whose government was ousted in the wake of a no-confidence motion last spring — asked his workers and supporters to prepare for the “Jail Bharo” movement across the country.
Imran Khan’s call came in the wake of sedition cases filed against his party’s Senior Vice-President Fawad Chaudhry and former member of the National Assembly Shandana Gulzar, while Senator Azam Swati and Shahbaz Gill were booked earlier for speaking against the military.
Commenting on the arrests and cases filed against members of the PTI as well as Sheikh Rashid, Maryam said they had been “crying like children”. “We spent five years and five months in jail with a smile, and they cried for five days of imprisonment.”
She also commented on how former army chief General (retd) Qamar Javed Bajwa realised a “blunder like Imran Khan” was made by him. “Now the confession is not enough. The stain on the country and nation’s heads will have to be removed. This blunder must be thrown away from the country.”
Meanwhile, on Kashmir Solidarity Day on Sunday, the PML-N senior leader saluted the struggle of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir’s (IIOJK) people who have been resisting the injustices on them.
“One day Kashmir will be Pakistan,” she said while acknowledging the sacrifices of Kashmiri mothers and daughters.
Speaking on the occasion, Federal Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah Khan said that Imran Khan should begin his jail filling movement soon, so he can “treat” him in prison.
The PML-N stalwart said, “They [PTI leaders] will be kept where we were kept… we will not be harsh like you and will provide all facilities, but, we will not provide that one thing without which you cannot live”.
He said that propaganda is being done that maybe PML-N is afraid of elections. “PML-N is not afraid of the election… we will contest the election and form the government in Punjab after winning it,” he added.
The interior minister said that Nawaz Sharif made the country a nuclear power and Pakistan was going to become an Asian tiger under his reign. Nawaz Sharif, he further said, made six nuclear explosions for the sake of the country compared to India’s five, adding that the world did not accept that any Muslim country became a nuclear power.
Rana Sanaullah said that Pakistan exists today only because it became a nuclear power. He said the economy was progressing in the 1990s. “India would have attacked us if were not a nuclear power under prevailing economic crisis.”