Opposition to protest outside CM House

A petition will also be filed in court

PESHAWAR:

Opposition members of provincial assembly (MPAs) in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) have decided to go for yet another protest against the government which is reluctant to release their development funds despite repeated assurances.

They have decided to protest outside the CM House and even move court against it to put pressure on the PTI government.

Talking to The Express Tribune opposition MPAs blamed that the CM Mahmood Khan’s government was using the development funds as a pressure and blackmailing tool and they had been completely cornered in this regard.

They said that development funds were being used to create division among the opposition parties as some MPAs were being provided funds while others were being completely ignored.

They blamed that in the past three years PTI MPAs had been provided with large funds while funds for the opposition exist only on paper.

“Each opposition MPA has been given only Rs25 million in three years while some of them have not been given even this nominal amount in order to put them under constant pressure,” they added.

They said in this situation they have no option but to go for another protest and sit-in against the government.

“Some PTI MPAs have been given Rs1 billion in three years too while the constituencies of opposition MPAs have been ignored in development projects,” they maintained, adding that some opposition MPAs have been given funds who secretly support government and the CM and so the government is using development funds to divide the opposition. “Two members of the kitchen cabinet of Mahmood Khan are behind this policy of divide and rule and their strategy has been working very well,” they said.

Even the women MPAs of PTI have been given Rs100 million per year but the female MPAs of opposition parties along with their minority MPA have been deprived of these funds.

When contacted, MPA Nighat Orakzai of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) confirmed that funds are announced by the government but never ever released as a pressure tactic.

Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) MPA Ikhtiar Wali said that he was elected MPA 10 months ago but he has not been provided with a single penny.

“I inflicted a crushing and exemplary defeat on the PTI candidate in the by-elections and they are settling the score this way,” Wali noted.

“We are considering moving court against it because we have been deprived of development funds as well as maintenance funds for roads,” he said, adding that a protest will be held outside the CM House too.

It is worth mentioning here that last year too opposition MPAs established a protest camp outside the CM House after which CM assured them that their problems will be solved. Nothing practical, however, came out of it.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2021.