Daily Times

KARACHI: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan Wednesday claimed that his party will secure the required number of seats in the coming elections to form a government in the Centre.

“Next government is ours. But, never consider your opponents weak,” the PTI chief told his supporters while addressing a gathering during a two-day visit to the metropolis as part of his party’s election campaign.

The PTI chief lamented that the country is under heavy. He said that a country progresses with institutions “but our rulers have destroyed the institutions.” “The rain in Lahore has exposed the tall claims of progress and the Paris that Lahore was supposed to have turned into is nothing but a lie,” he said, while criticising the PML-N government.

“Pakistan is lagging behind in the world, even in the subcontinent which is one of the poorest regions,” he said. “Even Bangladesh is ahead of us. The nation is in debt like it has never been before … the rupee is sliding [against the dollar]. People want change. People of Sindh are ready for change,” he added.

The PTI chief termed the development of the port city critical to Pakistan’s progress. “Pakistan cannot progress if its biggest city Karachi isn’t managed well. If voted to power, we will introduce an empowered local government system in Karachi and take care of the city’s growing water needs by building desalination plants and power projects,” he said, as he lamented the lack of basic facilities in the country’s largest city. He further criticised the police in the provincial capital and said the force has become too much politicised.

Separately, addressing a ceremony organised by the Association of Builders and Developers (ABAD), Imran said after coming into power, his government will build five million low-cost houses in the country in collaboration with ABAD.

While announcing national housing policy of the PTI, Imran said that construction sector was the guarantee to bringing in economic revolution in the country. “First of all, we will undertake infrastructure work including provision of water, electricity and gas. Target of constructing five million low-cost houses is a big challenge but we will aggressively pursue it as we want to provide houses to millions of homeless people in the county,” he said. “This venture will create thousands of jobs for the unemployed youth and we hope that economic crisis of Pakistan will also be overcome if we are able to reach even near to the target,” he maintained.

Imran also announced to provide 300,000 to 400,000 plots to the poor families and spend zakat money for social housing in the country. He said the demand of houses in Pakistan was enormous and the construction of five million houses would not only boost the construction sector but also bring boom to 100 allied industries. He said the PTI government would introduce one-window operation for the construction sector so that no bureaucrat could dare to take kickbacks and builders and developers are able to do business without any hindrance.

Published in Daily Times, July 5^th 2018.