SWABI: Adviser to the prime minister on political affairs and heritage Amir Maqam on Tuesday squarely blamed the previous Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government for ‘weakening’ the state institutions and ‘pushing’ the country to the verge of default through its ‘flawed’ policies.

In the same breath, he said now former prime minister Imran Khan was striving to scuttle the International Monetary Fund deal with Pakistan.

Addressing a party workers’ gathering after inaugurating the Mansabdar grid station here, he said had the coalition government not come to power, Pakistan would have defaulted.

Mr Muqam insisted the government of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif had eliminated the menace of terrorism and restored peace in the country, especially in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, but the four years of PTI in the centre and about 10 years in KP had ‘reversed’ all the gains.

He declared PTI leadership had misled the people, saying the track-record of Imran Khan and his clique showed they had no interest in people’s welfare.

He insisted only the PML-N leadership could drive the country out of the crises.

He urged youth not to support “liar” Imran Khan as it would be a ‘great injustice’ to the country and the nation. He said the PTI chief was now pressuring judiciary to support his “illegal” actions.

Mr Muqam flayed Imran Khan for deceiving mases through his pre-election mantra that he would convert the Prime Minister’s House into a university.

He said Imran had earlier claimed that US was involved in the overthrow of his government, but now he had declared that Washington did not hatch any conspiracy against his party.

The PML-N leader said the Mansabdar grid station was built at a cost of Rs800 million.

He said the government would start work on the gas supply projects, which the last PML-N government had started before the 2013 elections, but the PTI government had scrapped them.

ARREST: The police arrested 17 proclaimed offenders during operations in last two days, district police officer Najamul Hussain said on Tuesday.

Talking to mediapersons, he said the crackdown on criminals would continue. He said the police also recovered four Kalashnikovs, three rifles, a Kalakov, 22 pistols and several cartridges from the outlaws.

He said he had assigned a special task to the police to run a full-fledged campaign against the wanted criminals involved in murder, attempted murder and other serious crimes.

Published in Dawn, March 15th, 2023