No plan to privatise PIA: aviation minister

Ghulam Sarwar says govt wants to bring back airline to its days of glory

RAWALPINDI:

Minister for Aviation Ghulam Sarwar Khan on Saturday said that the government has no plan to privatise the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), rather “we will bring reforms in it”.

“The government wants to bring back the airline to its days of glory,” the minister said while addressing a news conference on Saturday.

Sarwar claimed that the government had eliminated the problems of PIA.

“Seven hundred and sixty-two employees, including 83 pilots, were fired from the PIA over fake degrees,” Sarwar said, adding that when the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf came to power, the PIA’s deficit was Rs400 billion.

On the Pakistan Democratic Movement’s Gujranwala gathering, the minister said that the opposition is working on the agenda of enemies of Pakistan as they only targeted state institutions levelling baseless allegations.

Sarwar condemned the derogatory language used against the institutions of Pakistan, saying that the PDM wants to see a clash between the institutions to destabilise the country but their conspiracies would never be succeed.

The minister said that former prime minister Nawaz Sharif is a proclaimed offender and declared him part two of the MQM founder, adding that “Pakistan Army is guarantor of peace and stability in the country”.

He also paid rich tribute to security personnel for rendering their lives for the protection of the homeland, saying that the entire “nation is standing with the institutions and salutes them”.

“Opposition parties in their gathering did not condemn the two incidents in which 20 security personnel were martyred because they have the same agenda as terrorists, who are targeting the civilians and law enforcement agencies through bullets while the opposition through derogatory language,” he added. “Opposition has its democratic right to contact the masses but the facts of corruption and the verdicts of the courts against the opposition leadership in this regard could not be falsified through politics of agitation.”

The minister said that the opposition parties were trying to halt the accountability process against their bosses and it did not want development and stability in the country.

To a question, the minister said that the government will overcome inflation and unemployment soon in the country caused by the flawed policies of previous regimes. "We will take all legal measures to repatriate Sharif," he added.