Pakistan

I condemn govt’s double standards if Sohna picked up from home: Zubair

PML-N leader says he highlights govt’s mistakes even in party meetings

Our Correspondent November 05, 2015

PHOTO: REUTERS

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Muhammad Zubair has said he would condemn the government’s double standards if it turned out that the police had arrested Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Ashraf Sohna from his residence.

Sohna was reportedly arrested, along with his supporter, after a brawl with PML-N workers in Okara during the first phase of the local government (LG) polls last week.

“Such things should not happen,” he said, while taking to Express News host Javed Chaudhry in his show ‘Kal Tak’. Zubair said it was too easy to criticise anyone on television shows. “But I also pinpoint government’s mistakes in party meetings,” he said.

He said he condemned both the PML-N leaders – Abid Sher Ali and Rana Sanaullah – who have been issuing statements against each other. He said they should not make these issue statements against each other.

Zubair said the Punjab government is spending more money on education and health than any other province. “Punjab is ahead of Khyber-Pakhtunkwa (K-P) in terms of development work,” he claimed.

He said the Pakistan Tehreek-eInsaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan seemed to have accepted the result of the first phase of the LG elections in Punjab. He said the Pakistan People Party (PPP) was delivering in Sindh that was why the people had voted for it in the LG polls.

PTI’s Ejaz Chaudhry said the LG polls which the prime minister was presenting as a sign of his party’s popularity were rigged according to one of his federal ministers, Abid Sher Ali. He said the present government had overburdened every citizen of Pakistan with foreign loans.

“A federal and a provincial minister are nominated in FIRs for murder; but the police neglected them and arrested Ashraf Sohna from his house,” he said, adding that he did not protest against Sohna’s arrest but raised an objection to the government’s double standards.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 5^th, 2015.