Daily Times

Leader of the Opposition in Punjab Assembly Hamza Shahbaz on Thursday said that the arrests and detentions by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) would not improve the poor state of economy of the country, and the masses would not get their bread and butter through such arrests.

He was speaking on the floor of the House in the Punjab Assembly, as he was brought to attend the session by a NAB team after his production order was issued by Speaker Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi in the morning. Speaking on a point of order, Hamza said that there was a dire need to learn from the past mistakes if “we want to put the country on the right track of progress”.

Expressing his distrust over the NAB, he said that he was earlier accused of being involved in Rs 85 billion money laundering case by the NAB. “The NAB then claimed that the amount of money laundering was Rs 33 billion and now the NAB officials are accusing me of 180 million only,” he said.

“I’ll say goodbye to politics forever and will sit at home if corruption of even a single penny is proved against me,” he said, adding that several cases against his family were made in the past but all were proved fabricated and biased. He claimed that an army general once told him during the dictatorship of Pervez Musharraf that all the cases against him were fabricated and made at the behest of Musharraf. “Who will return those days that I spent in imprisonment under forged allegations and who will return the life of a politician who was judicially murdered,” asked Hamza in an emotional tone. “No one is ready to invest here as the country is passing through its worst economic crisis where our rupee is the most devalued currency in the whole South Asia, but Prime Minister Imran Khan was more interested in sending the leaders behind the bars rather than steering the nation out of the current economic crisis,” he said.

The opposition leader also paid his gratitude to Speaker Pervaiz Elahi for issuing his production order.

Earlier, MPA Saeed Akbar Nawani, who got elected as an independent MPA for record seventh term, on a point of order strongly condemned the government while saying that it was tantamount to make mockery of this House that passes a legislation but no implementation was ensured on that legislation. He said the House passed a bill relating to an increase in the salaries of MPAs but the decision was not implemented, which was regrettable. “I have never seen such an episode in my whole parliamentary career where the privilege of this House was breached in such a manner,” he said. Responding to Nawani’s reservation, Law Minster Raja Basharat downplayed his claim and expelled the impression saying the bill was still under due process, which needed the governor’s signature.

Over the production order of Hamza Shahbaz, Raja Basharat said Speaker Pervaiz Elahi, Prime Minister Imran Khan and the Chief Minister Usman Buzdar should be praised, as their efforts bore fruit and the government empowered this House to issue production orders. He said the son of the incumbent speaker was behind the bars in the past, but then speaker Rana Iqbal didn’t issue his production order despite repeated attempts made by the opposition at that time. “The cases against the leaderships of the PML-N and the PPP were not made by Imran Khan, as they had made cases against each other in the past, and now they are facing the music,” he said. “Don’t bring us in this matter, as you appointed the NAB chairman and you were the rulers for the last 10 years,” he said.

The PPP MPAs were wearing black armbands in protest against the NAB’s arrest of their leader and former president Asif Ali Zardari, while they strongly condemned his arrest by the NAB. The Hose proceedings started at 4:35pm despite the scheduled time of 3pm. During the question hour, Parliamentary Secretary Tariq Abdullah gave answers to the questions put forward by the lawmakers regarding the Transport Department. As the agenda items of the House were completed, the speaker adjourned the House until Friday at 3pm.