PTI leaders issue blunt warning to govt

Party leaders say national unity will be threatened if CPEC share isn’t given

PESHAWAR: Leaders of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Thursday warned the federal government of serious consequences if it failed to address Khyber-Pakhunkhwa’s reservations over the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

The warning was jointly issued by K-P Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser and Adviser to the Chief Minister Mushtaq Ghani at a time when PTI chief Imran Khan assured China’s ambassador that his party would never create any hurdles in the project.



“National unity will be threatened if K-P and other small provinces are deprived of their rights in the economic corridor,” Asad Qaiser told hundreds of students of different educational institutions at a seminar held at Nishtar Hall here. “K-P, Balochistan and Sindh have all expressed reservations over the project,” said Asad Qaiser.

He claimed that K-P did not oppose development projects in other provinces, but small provinces should also be given their due share.

The seminar was arranged by the Insaf Students Federation (ISF).

Several resolutions, Qaiser said, had been passed by the provincial assembly for urgently building the western corridor in accordance with the decision taken at the APC.



According to Qaiser, the resolutions had been sent to the federal government, but it had not responded yet on the issue.

As much as 70 per cent of all CPEC projects were confined to just one province, he said.

“Our province is war-torn … we must have our due share in development projects,” said Mushtaq Ghani, the adviser to the CM on information and higher education,

Ghani said that the K-P government wanted the federal government to enforce the decision taken at the APC on CPEC. .

Published in The Express Tribune, October 21^st, 2016.