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By Z Ali

PHOTO: File

HYDERABAD: PTI Chairman Imran Khan reiterated on Tuesday that he would now pursue PPP Co-
chairman Asif Ali Zardari, the “biggest disease plaguing Sindh”.

“We will take this accountability to its logical conclusion. One of them [former prime minister Nawaz
Sharif] is gone now. Now we will go after Zardari and will put him in the prison,” Imran said while
addressing a public rally in Hyderabad. “Zardari, now it’s your turn,” he added.

In this one of the PTI’s rare public mobilisation activities in Hyderabad, Imran briefly outlined the
party’s reform plan for Sindh if it came to power. However, most part of his speech was reserved for
slamming former PM Sharif and former president Zardari, whose party rules the province.

“The PPP got six terms in Sindh and the PML-N also got six terms in Punjab. But they [PPP] didn’t
build a single hospital in Sindh where Zardari could go for medical treatment. Similarly there isn’t a
single hospital in Punjab where Sharif, Kulsoom Nawaz or Shehbaz Sharif could go.”

Imran ascribed all the problems of Sindh to Zardari and his sister MNA Faryal Talpur and questioned
how much money the two siblings wanted to amass. “Zardari is the biggest illness of Sindh. Talpur
should also tell us in whose pockets the ill-gotten money goes which she gathers by selling govern-
ment jobs?”

He said Zardari used to black movie tickets outside Bambino cinema in Karachi while his father owned
only 150 acres of land. But now, he claimed, Zardari’s wealth had skyrocketed and he owned 19 sugar
mills, huge swathes of agricultural lands and hotels and properties in Dubai and UK.

“If the National Accountability Bureau, the Federal Board of Revenue and the Federal Investigation
Agency had been strong and autonomous, they would have caught and convicted Sharif and Zardari
for corruption and fraud. If the courts were working properly, like the apex court is working now,
both of them would be in jail,” he added.

Imran Khan also asked the PPP’s chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari to tell the nation what credentials
he possessed that qualified him for the position of leading the whole nation. “Have you worked or
earned even for a day?” the PTI chief asked.

He compared the PPP’s founding leader Zulfikar Ali Bhutto with his grandson Bilawal and said Bhutto
struggled in politics before coming to power unlike his grandson. “Have you ever questioned your
father [Zardari] from where did he get so much wealth or your aunt why jobs and contracts are sold?”

Imran mocked Sharif and the MQM founder Altaf Hussain, saying both the leaders had united in their
exile in London. “Now both will make telephonic speeches and heap scorn on the army.”

He also criticised Sharif’s daughter Maryam Nawaz and accused her of conspiring against the armed
forces at the behest of Pakistan’s enemies. Referring to her Sept 17 speech in Lahore, the PTI chief
said the speech manifested who was behind the Dawn Leaks scandal.

The PTI’s Vice Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi asked the people of Sindh to take cue from people
of Punjab who have rejected the PPP. He gave example that the party secured only around 1,400
votes in by-election on Sep 17 in Lahore’s NA-120 constituency which it had won thrice during
Bhutto’s time.

“Imran Khan you go to Punjab and I [Qureshi] am coming to Sindh,” he announced, suggesting that
Imran will lead the PTI’s campaign for 2018 general elections in Punjab and he will do the same in
Sindh.

Source:The Express Tribune/tribune.com.pk