Imran Khan is the biggest crisis of this century: Bilawal Bhutto

Islamabad: Chairman Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Bilawal Bhutto Zardari in his address on the floor of the National Assembly has declared Prime Minister Imran Khan the biggest crisis of the century.

Speaking at the National Assembly, Chairman Bilawal said that the government approached the IMF in desperation. The government was on weak wicket when it started negotiation with the IMF. We had said the PTIMF deal a bad deal at that time. We had called it a weak deal which will be economic strangulation for the people of Pakistan. The poor people will pay the price of this deal with price hike, poverty, crises of gas, Petrol, electricity and inflation. The leader of opposition and President Zardari had asked you to consult the opposition but you took decision in isolation and the people of Pakistan were harmed by your solo decision. The government did not get opposition’s input. You could have said to the IMF that the opposition is not agreed to accept this deal. The government did not accept that cooperation and compromised the economic independence of the people.

Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that after the IMF deal government once again presented a budget but at that time every economic indicator was worst in history of the country. The growth had fallen to -0.4% which was the lowest in history. We fought wars, the country was dismembered and the world was in worst recession but the economy was not fallen so low and in negative. The is the record low. The government has broken all the records of inflation, poverty, price hike and unemployment. The meaning of “Naya Pakistan” is price hike, poverty and unemployment. We said this is not change but it is destruction. The government tell lies instead of telling the truth of the nation. They were saying that the economy is booming. Everyone is entitled to an opinion but not entitled to his own fact.

At the time of presenting the budget after the budget during negative growth, the government had claimed that the era of economic prosperity has started. The government had called it zero tax budget. The government had said that it will not impose any taxes and there will be no mini budget. This the government had said in the month of June. Now the government is bring the tsunami of taxes. One does not have to be an economic expert to see that there will be new taxes worth Rs. 350 billion and there will be 250 billion rupees cut in development budget. No people’s representative can take such decisions. This government obeys the directives and orders of the IMF. The government and its allies will not be able to face the public. The people of Pakistan will treat you in such a manner that you will not be able to forget.

The PM who used to say that he will come to his office on bicycle now travels on Helicopter from Banigala to the PM office. In this mini budget he has taxed the bicycle of poor people. The government has increased 100 % tax of all kind of vehicles. All the vehicles manufactured in Pakistan will have 17% tax. Imran Khan claimed to be leader of youth of the country but taxed everything used by the youth like small cars, laptops, telephone, internet and bicycles. Chairman Bilawal said that last year Pakistan has fallen 14 grades in the digital quality of life and is at 97 out of 110 countries. The IT sector is the one of a few which the government could boast about but instead of encouraging this sector the government has started to suck blood from this sector as well. This sector if was encouraged could have been the one to provide jobs to the youth of Pakistan but this government has strangulated this sector as well.

At the moment the country is engulfed in agricultural crisis but this government is imposing tax on 1007 items. It has imposed 17% tax on the agricultural machinery. There is urea crisis in the country. The injustice in water distribution has already hurt the agriculture sector. The government is imposing tax on charity goods and donations. Tax has been imposed on goods for the UN, goods used to deal with natural disaster and gifts (equipments etc) for hospitals. This government is absent at every natural disaster like in the rain floods in Sindh and Balochistan.

Chairman PPP said that this government has taxed the sewing machines as well. “I will not speak on it, you must be understanding”. The government is taxing raw material for manufacturing and pharmaceutical at a time when the medicines have seen a historic rise in price and now it will increase further. The government has taxed solar panels at a time when Pakistan is suffering the most due to the impact of climate change. The government is also imposing tax on contraceptives at a time when HIV and AIDS are threatening the health of the people. Even the infant milk is being taxed. Local cotton seeds, edible oil, food items, bakery items are being taxed by the rate of 17%. Food is the provincial subject and the federal government is imposing tax on food as well.

The government says that Pakistan has the least price hike which is a lie because we have the most price hike in the region. This government says that the price hike is due to Sindh province. How many lies and for how long this government will tell because every child in the country know that Imran Khan is responsible for this price hike. From 2018 the food inflation has increased 54 %, price of edible oil increased 60%, electricity price increased 60% and lentils 30% which is robbery on the poor people of Pakistan. When there was inflation during PPP government we had started BISP to give relief to the poor women of Pakistan. We increased pension up to 100%, salaries up to 120 % and salaries of soldiers up to 175%. We demand of this government to increase salaries up to 100%. Sindh government has set minimum wages at Rs. 25000 but this was challenged in the Sindh High Court and when the court decided in PPP’s Sindh government the rich approached the Supreme Court which issued stay order. We demand that this stay order should be lifted. An international institution had evaluated the living wages as Rs. 27000 during the PPP government. The Sindh government minimum wage is still less than the required. The government should help the poor and not the rich.

Chairman Bilawal said that the growers of the entire country are troubled and protesting due to government policies. They are not getting adequate price of their crops. In the month of November 2021 the government ministers were claiming that there is excess urea in the country but in December the growers are looking for urea but it is not available. This urea crisis will create food crisis in the country in coming months. This is the only government which creates one after the other crisis. Imran Khan used to say that there is a crisis in every century and Imran Khan is the crisis of this century.

Chairman PPP said that the people are flabbergasted by the statements of the ministers of this government. One minister said that urea is smuggled to Afghanistan from Sindh. He does not know that there is sea on one side of Sindh and on the other the border of Sindh is with India where our troops are deployed. If he says that the urea is being smuggled to Afghanistan then he should check the borders of Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and PTI is ruling both these provinces. If the urea is being smuggled then the PTI government is responsible. This allegation on Sindh is a lie but when we investigated it was revealed that 1, 50000 bags were given to two ministers from the Sindh’s stock. This will hurt our agriculture. The government says that urea will be available from 20 February but we cannot wait and we will stage growers rally in this month so that we can expose this government.

Regarding the PTI government’s health card Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said this is to benefit private hospitals and insurance companies. This card has the same amount for the rich and the poor and this is not the correct use of our resources. This will harm the government health sector.The aim should be to provide health facilities to the poor people of Pakistan. This could be done by providing them free health facilities like Sindh has three hospitals (NICVD, Gumbat hospital and SIUT) which provided free health facilities to the people. The amount the Sindh government provides to these three hospitals is more than the entire budget of health card in KP. Sindh provided 24 billion rupees to these hospitals which treat people free of cost for heart, liver and kidney problems as opposed to 21 billion to the entire KP health card. If the government had improved the government hospitals with the money of health card then it would have been money best spent and people could have been treated free of cost.

Chairman PPP said that the most important point is our economic sovereignty. The government says that the country’s economy plays an important role in national security. The government’s legislation will make the State Bank of Pakistan a slave to the IMF and this will be the greatest attack on Pakistan’s economic sovereignty which will also impact the national security. No one in history of Pakistan accepted this in the history of Pakistan. The SBP should be answerable to the parliament and the judiciary. This legislation says that there will be no new borrowing from the SBP. The government takes loan from the SBP and takes care in taking loan. How is it possible that the governments in future cannot go to SBP for loan from the bank which is the bank of the people of Pakistan, bank of the nation. Instead the government will have to go to commercial and international banks for loans on their conditions. The government increased the tenure of the governor of SBP from 3 years to 5 years with a salary of one crore and 50 lacs. This legislation also provided immunity to governor, deputy governor and directors of SBP which is NRO given by Imran Khan. This is part of an international conspiracy that will impact CPEC, our foreign policy and our relations with our neighbours. This will create problems for our nuclear programme. This legislation says that there will be only one defense account and that too in the same SBP which will be overseen by the international financial institutions. We are exposing our nuclear programme to the world.

Chairman Bilawal said that at a time when Pakistan is isolated and people are troubled and ready to come on the streets mat create anarchy and that will benefit our international enemies. We have two questions to ask from the government. First is about NAB which has accused everyone of corruption but when its Chairman was summoned by the Public Accounts Committee of the Parliament, the PM Khan stopped him from going to PAC. Why Khan saves him. Is it because he saves Khan? The NAB had claimed that it has recovered Rs. 800 billion of corruption but there is only RS. 6 billion is deposited in the treasury. We demand the all the NAB officials from the Chairman NAB to the investigation officers should disclose their assets. Now the NAB has been caught red handed.

The question from Imran Khan is that before becoming the prime minister he had paid over 2 lac tax but now after assuming the Prime Minister seat he has paid over 98 lac rupees. Has he got a magic wand that his income has increased 5800%. At a time when the people are becoming poorer, Khan becomes filthy rich. How is it possible when he does not have any business and says that he made money from selling cricket toys. WE are starting our long march from Karachi on 27 February and will hold him accountable. Now enough is enough.