BADIN: Pakistan Peoples Party Sindh president Nisar Ahmed Khuhro has rejected media reports about his party’s possible alliance with Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government and said the party will never provide crutches to a government which is itself busy in its undoing.

Khuhro told journalists in Tando Bago on Saturday that the PPP would never like to sit with “naive” leaders who had created a mess in the country and made peoples’ lives miserable by burdening them with massive inflation. He claimed the rulers imposed on the country would never be able to complete their tenure. PTI government had broken all past records of incompetence and misrule in the country and the party had better step down before it was booted out of power, he said.

He said the federal government had muddied things over transfer of Sindh’s IGP though it was a prerogative of a provincial government to change or post IGPs and other officers of its choice to key posts.

He said that after miserably failing to live up to peoples’ expectations PTI government was now creating problems for Sindh, where government affairs were being run “smoothly” by the chief minister and his team.

Khuhro said that cracks had already appeared in the ranks of PTI leadership at a time when their main coalition partners were thinking of parting ways with the ruling party.

He asked the federal government to stop discrimination against Sindh. The PTI government had denied Sindh more than 30,000 jobs in various federal departments and gave jobs of Sindh’s quota to people from Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, he said.

He asked the rulers to mend their ways towards people of Sindh who had laid down great sacrifices for democracy and lashed out at PTI government for its “utter failure” to restore agriculture sector of the country. Imran Khan and his aides were responsible for wheat flour and grains shortage in the country, he said.

Khuhro claimed that PPP government was doing its best to improve infrastructure in Sindh despite serious financial challenges. Despite limited resources Sindh government was all set to construct over 4,000 buildings of schools and roads across the province.

He said that it was also responsibility of PPP government to ensure just and judicious supply of water up till tail-end areas of the province including Badin district. Sindh government had undertaken a number of mega projects to provide water to all farmers without any discrimination, he said.

In Badin, Khuhro told media persons after condoling with MPA Taj Mohammad Mallah at his residence that people of Sindh did not support Imran Khan because he did not respect provincial autonomy. The country‘s welfare depended on strong federal units, he said.

He said that PTI government had failed to deliver and it had increased problems for people due to high inflation. The very day the PTI came to power it slashed Rs1,000 billion budget for development, he claimed.

PTI government had not so far launched any important programme and took “250 U-turns”. It had created a sense of deprivation among people, he said. “What can we do if FBR doesn’t function well,” he asked.

He said the PTI government was pursuing a policy of ‘divide and rule’. The PPP wanted Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan to join Sindh government for the welfare and betterment of the province, he said and hoped the MQM would also join Sindh’s government while remaining part of central government.

He said that PPP was not opposing sentence of execution for those convicted of child abuse but it was merely opposed to hanging in public.

Published in Dawn, February 9th, 2020