Daily Times

JHELUM: Minister for Information and Broadcasting Chaudhry Fawad Hussain said that Maryam Nawaz and Bilawal Bhutto Zardari did not have political stature to become national leaders as the country could not be handed over to political novices.

Talking to media here, the minister advised them to first contest the election of mayor. He said that political novices should vacate their positions for senior leadership of their respective parties. After the defeat of the Opposition in the Senate, he said it was once again proved that all the Opposition parties had no political weight against Prime Minister Imran Khan. No leader of all political parties could match the stature of Imran Khan, he added.

He said that Pakistan was a democratic country not a monarchy, so heirs of political hierarchies could not ascend to the throne. He said that change was now being discussed within PML-N as its workers want replacement of Sharif family.

He said a similar debate should also take place within the PPP to bring experienced leaders at top Party slots as if Bilawal and Maryam come up through the political process then they had the right, but there was no justification to impose them on the senior party leaders.

Fawad was of the opinion that the Opposition parties had no value inside or outside the Parliament and all their efforts to launch a movement failed in the past and their seventh attempt would be no different.

He said lacking public support, the Opposition had to depend on students of Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s madrassas as he had an old habit of using them for political purposes but it was not possible to dislodge an elected government through an agitation by students of seminaries. “We have no personal enmity with Maryam Nawaz and Nawaz Sharif, we want to bring back the looted wealth from them as the people want national wealth to be brought back” Chaudhry Fawad maintained.

He said that many people meet Nawaz Sharif in expensive apartments but he still had the audacity to claim that apartments were not owned by him.

The minister said that Nawaz Sharif’s monthly expenses were tens of millions of rupees but nothing was told about his source of income. Looking at tax returns of Nawaz Sharif, his wealth was illegal money stolen from the nation, he remarked.

He said that British government had rejected Nawaz Sharif’s two applications for visa extension and after realizing the situation, Sharif family had started saying that Nawaz Sharif was coming to Pakistan. “Nawaz Sharif knows that he will not get another chance to stay in UK, he will have to come back,” the minister said.

He said that the Opposition parties were not sincere with each other and working for their own interests, they might be involved in physical brawls in future. He said that the effort to create political anarchy in the country had failed and the Opposition, which had the upper hand in the Senate, failed to block legislative bills moved by the government. The minister said now it had been proved that the government enjoyed majority support not only in the National Assembly but in the Senate as well.

Fawad remarked that PML-N and other Opposition parties were in a quandary, as they suffered a humiliating defeat in the Senate on Friday and they would face the same fate in future too.

The minister said that former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and the then finance minister Ishaq Dar ruined the country’s economy and the present government which inherited a truncated economy, had put it on the revival path. Fawad Hussain said that today the profit of 100 big companies was Rs 929 billion, industries including agriculture were on their feet due to prudent policies of Prime Minister Imran Khan.

He said that the profit of media houses had also increased significantly, some media owners have increased the salaries of their employees, other institutions and companies should also increase the salaries of their employees.

Today, he said that the industrial sector was earning profit and agricultural production had increased and farmers had benefited from this development, adding that that a deep conspiracy was behind sabotaging the operations in Balochistan. He expressed solidarity with the families of those Pakistan Army soldiers who sacrificed their lives in Balochistan. “Brave soldiers of Pakistan Army sacrificed their lives for defense of the motherland”, Chaudhry Fawad said, adding that every Pakistani was grateful to the martyred soldiers and the whole nation stood with the parents of these martyrs and their families.

The blood of our martyred youth will not go waste and conspiracies of its enemies would not succeed, rather Pakistan will remain on the map of earth till eternity. We will continue the war against terrorism, the blood of our martyred soldiers will be fully accounted for, Chaudhry Fawad said emphatically.

About the upcoming visit of Prime Minister Imran Khan to China, he said that it was very important which would help further strengthening of bilateral relations in various fields. He said that the Prime Minister would embark on more foreign visits in next few months which would further strengthen Pakistan’s international standing and foreign policy would get a boost.

He said that if anyone thought that the PTI would backtrack from the accountability process, its voters would not allow it. The minister said Ravi Urban project was not a housing society, rather an entire new city was being built.