Daily Times

KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples Party Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has asked the Punjab government to stop strangulating the economic strangulation of the province’s poor people. He criticised the diversion of public resources to white elephant projects such as the Rs162 billion Orange Line.

“It is shameful that the Punjab government has forced the peasantry into endless protesting, compelling more than 6,000 employees of Rural Health Support Programme (RHSP) to hold dharnas in Lahore and elsewhere amid this heat wave,” Bilawal Bhutto Zardari stated, while expressing solidarity with the farmers and RHSP who are protesting in Lahore today.

One of the peasants Samiullah, died during a demonstration of Pakistan Kissan Ittehad (PKI) in Lahore while 6,000 employees, mostly women of RHSP stand to suffer because of retrenchment by the Punjab government. Most protesting farmers under the umbrella of PKI came from Multan, Lodhran, Kabirwala, and Bahawalpur.

The PPP Chairman warned Punjab’s government to avoid repeating its history of snatching livelihood from people whenever it came into power, after deceiving people by making false promises during elections. “The PPP won’t allow it to withhold the rights of poor farmers and employees of PHSP,” he added.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari pointed out that the Sharif brothers were spending a staggering Rs162 billion on the Orange Line Train to serve just 100,000 commuters while a mere Rs59 and Rs54 billion were allocated for the entire education and health budgets respectively.