PPP castigates PTI for ‘double standards’

LAHORE: PPP Information Secretary Dr Nafisa Shah says new disclosures are being made about the PTI daily as its leadership is involved in corruption.

Speaking at a press conference along with Munawwar Anjum and Hassan Murtaza here on Sunday, she recalled that the PTI election manifesto was anti-corruption and one Pakistan for all. But, after coming into power, it adopted double standards on corruption, she said.

She said prime minister’s sister Aleema Khan who is caretaker of Shaukat Khanum Hospital’s donations, had been found to be owning $450 million property in New Jersey, US declared in the amnesty scheme in 2017. She asked whether the demand by opposition for investigation of the affair was just or not.

Likewise, she said, financial affairs and contracts of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government during the last five years as well as fake accounts of the PTI funds must also be probed.

The PPP leader said Minister of State for Interior Shehryar Afridi talked of use of drugs by Islamabad college girls but the fact is that his own nephew had been caught smuggling drugs and Mr Afridi should decide his punishment on his own.

She told a questioner that the PPP would move every forum including courts against Aleema Khan, Imran Khan, Jahangir Tareen, Aleem Khan and others.

She lamented that names of her party leaders were placed on the Exit Control List (ECL) on the report of a so-called JIT and that despite the Supreme Court orders the same were not being removed from the list. Whereas, she pointed out, the name of Liaquat Jatoi was removed from the list despite investigation.

Ms Shah chided the finance minister for changing stance on national economy. She said Asad Umar took third U-turn in six months as he said Islamabad was not going to the IMF but was giving a second budget. She asked which government would give a second budget in six months.

Responding to a question, she said Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari had talked of march on Islamabad on the basis of issues unlike Imran Khan’s attack on parliament. “We are in contact with the masses. With the support of the masses we’ll march on Islamabad when the conditions will become intolerable.”

Answering another question, she said the PPP had taken a principled stance against military courts.