Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: A report – currently under discussion in the power corridors – has disclosed that Federal Minister for Information Pervaiz Rashid allegedly contacted one of the country’s most creditable media groups and tried to get published a sensitive news item, which was later published in an English daily.

According to the report, the minister personally contacted the lower staff of the media group for the publication of this news, but they refused and told him that it was a highly sensitive matter.

After refusal from the lower level, the minister contacted the owner of the group for the publication of the “leaked story” regarding the top-level meeting on security, which was held at the Prime Minister’s House.

On this, the owner of the media group replied that they were already out of the “good books of some influential authorities”, and advised the minister to get the news item published in Dawn.

According to the report, a powerful bureaucrat, Fawad Hasan Fawad, who is also a close ally of the premier, leaked the minutes of the meeting.

Later, on the advice of the media group’s owner, the information minister shared the information with Umber Sehgal and asked for publication of this news.

Sehgal reportedly brought these notes to Cyril Almeida. The report also claimed that the editor and resident editor of the English daily were not fully informed about the matter.

Here rises an important question: how it is possible that the prime minister was not taken on board on such a sensitive matter. Rumours are circulating in the government circles that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz were the real directors of this whole episode.

Meanwhile, the report also speaks about former minister Mushahidullah Khan and the controversy that led to his resignation following an interview with BBC Urdu, in which he accused a former intelligence chief of having plotted against the country’s leaders.

According to the report, Prime Minister’s Secretary Mohiuddin Wani handed over an envelope to Senator Mushahidullah Khan, which contained answers to the questions that were to be given to a BBC reporter during an interview, as the PM could not speak against the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) director general.

In this regard, Ahsan Iqbal asked the then minister to go to the PM’s House to get the “points”. Mushahidullah met Maryam Nawaz, who referred him to Wani, where he handed him over the envelope.

After the interview, Mushahidullah was pressurised to resign, while Pervaiz Rashid also conveyed to him a message from the PM that he (Mushahidullah) should step down from the position.

On this, Mushahidullah Khan behaved oddly with Pervaiz Rashid and said, “I just said what had been asked from me.”

At that time, Mushahidullah was on a tour to Maldives. Upon his return, a special lunch was arranged for him with the premier, according to the report.

It added that during the meeting, Nawaz congratulated him on achieving the given targets. On the occasion, the premier told the senator that his portfolio was being taken back just to hoodwink the people.

He assured him that his close relatives would be inducted in the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) and other profitable organisations on lucrative posts, and just like in the past, they were ‘adjusted’, the report claimed.

Reliable sources said that Nawaz Sharif and his kitchen cabinet were now all set to make Pervaiz Rashid and Fawad Hussain Fawad scapegoats.

On the other hand, the security institutions wanted to unveil the real faces of those actually behind the leaks. Now, there are whispers in the government circles that the report regarding Cyril Almeida would be made public soon.