• Fawad says if federal government resists snap polls it should be sent home immediately
• Ex-Sindh governor claims party leader Haleem ‘tortured in custody’

ISLAMABAD: The Pak­istan Tehreek-i-Insaf has alleged that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari are hatching a conspiracy against the judiciary at a time when the rupee is fast losing its value against the dollar.

While speaking at a press conference along with former Sindh governor Imran Ismail in Islamabad, PTI Senior Vice President Fawad Chaudhry remarked there was no government in the country as the federation was silent on problems the nation was faced with.

The former information minister said the foreign minister did not go to his office for 12 days during the entire Punjab chief minister’s election case, which spoke volumes about his indifference to the affairs of his ministry.

“[Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs] Tariq Fatemi travelled to the US to lobby for Shehbaz Sharif, but he failed,” he said.

Shehbaz and Bilawal were hatching conspiracies against the judiciary while the rupee was on a constant decline, as it lost its value by Rs62 against the dollar in just 100 days, he claimed.

He went on to say that the country was facing myriad crises, with the dollar rising at an alarming pace and the stock market nose-diving. In such a situation, “we have to announce an election date and if the government resists, the PTI must send the government home without any further delay”, Fawad Chaudhry declared.

Coming down hard on Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah, Mr Chaudhry said the only solution to all the problems the country was embroiled in were snap polls. He taunted Mr Sanaullah, questioning how a person would manage to bring a no confidence motion against anyone when he could not save his chief minister in Punjab.

He said meetings were held in London to topple the PTI government, while one group within the PML-N became pro- and the other anti-establishment.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr Ismail said PTI leader Haleem Adil Sheikh had been arrested for the tenth time, alleging Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah wanted to hang him. He further said Mr Sheikh had been subjected to torture in custody.

Moreover, PTI leaders Asad Umar and Shaukat Tarin, in separate posts on social media, said the rupee had hit a new all-time low against the US dollar in the inter-bank market around midday on Thursday.

Mr Umar said the dollar had crossed the Rs240 mark and the economy was bleeding to death.

He said the gravity of the situation could be gauged from the fact that the rupee had lost over Rs62 against the dollar. This would result in further increases in the prices of energy products, including petrol, diesel, LNG and electricity.

The PTI chairman’s Chief of Staff Dr Shahbaz Gill hit out at Interior Minister Sanaullah, saying a “criminal who killed 14 people”, including pregnant women, in Model Town, was unaware that there was no foreign funding case with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

Addressing a press conference on Thursday, he said the “criminal” could not differentiate between foreign funding and prohibited funding. Gill said the ECP should decide the foreign or prohibited funding cases of all political parties collectively according to the orders of the high court, and bring the truth before the nation.

In a separate development, PTI chairman Imran Khan ordered the Punjab government on Thu­rsday to immediat­e­­ly provide assistance to the flood-stricken people of sou­­th Punjab and Mian­wali.

He said he had also directed the KP government to assist the Balochistan government in providing relief to the areas ravaged by floods.

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022