Daily Times

PESHAWAR: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan said on Sunday that his party would mobilise the masses to protect their rights if the national institutions fail to do so.

Addressing a rally in Peshawar that marked commencement of his party’s accountability movement, the PTI chairman warned Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif that the match was about to begin and it would not stop until the corrupt leaders are held accountable. He said the accountability movement had been launched to hold the institutions accountable that considered themselves above accountability and those who plundered the national assets.

Khan said the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) was adept in imposition of taxes on the marginalised section of the society and exempting the upper class of the country from taxes. He said that rich people of the country were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer due to absence of any mechanism for accountability in the country. He said the PTI would continue to mobilise the people to protest rallies as well as sit-ins until Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is held accountable. “This is just the beginning, this is just a trailer, the match is about to begin and it will not end till the accountability of all corrupt leaders of the country for good,” Khan announced during his address to the rally.

The PTI chairman said that poor people were languishing in jails on false charges, while the rich and the powerful were investing taxpayers’ money in real estate businesses abroad. He said the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had been supporting and protecting criminals and corrupt people since its inception. He said that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Federal Finance Minister Ishaq Dar and other senior ministers of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) were multiplying their foreign assets with the support of the NAB. He said that a few families were in control of all the national wealth and they were using it for the welfare of their own families, but at the cost of national institutions. “The institutions of Pakistan are not protecting your money and your interests, so you have to do it yourself. Institutions like the NAB, which are meant to hold the corrupt accountable, are protecting the corrupt like Nawaz Sharif and his cronies,” he said.

Khan said that corruption affected the ordinary people of Pakistan the most and made the poor the poorer. He said that national wealth was not spent properly on education and health institutions; it was embezzled in the name of mega projects. “Remember that this movement is the movement of every Pakistani who wants to free this country from the cancer of corruption. Do join us and do your share to this fight for a corruption-free Pakistan,” he said. He praised the youth of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for participating in the rally in such a hot and humid weather. He said the PTI would file another reference against Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who allegedly transferred national wealth abroad. He called upon the parliamentarians to question the prime minister about the sources of his income. He said the prime minister considered himself to be above the law.

PTI senior leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Pervez Khattak and party lawmakers accompanied Khan on the container where he stood to address the rally. Rallies from Malakand, Dir, Karak, Bannu, Dera Ismail Khan also reached Peshawar to join the main rally, which was set to march towards Attock.

PTI workers set up welcome camps on the routes of the rally to motivate the participants. Khan spoke to people at different points.

Supporters of the PML-N stopped PTI’s rally when it reached Kohat. They placed burning tyres on the road at four points and came face to face with participants in PTI’s rally, making them change their route. PML-N lawmaker Abbas Afridi led the anti-PTI crowd.