Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan on Wednesday questioned the credibility of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), saying that it is a party which will go to any extent to harm Pakistan for the lust of power. In a tit-for-tat response to the money laundering allegations against him by PML-N senior leader Khawaja Muhammad Asif, Imran said the party at least should have done some investigation into the matter before going public on an issue which is baseless.
"Abnormal? Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital is not Imran Khan's personal hospital...the patients who are being treated without charging a single penny are not my relatives, they are Pakistanis," he added. He went on saying that after exhausting all options to accuse PTI, the PML-N finally targeted the hospital, which is tantamount to harm Pakistan as it is only hospital which gives free of cost treatment to needy patients.
Lamenting that the PML-N dragged a welfare institute into the mud of politics, the PTI chief said the finger-pointers should have attacked him instead tarnishing the image of the hospital. Terming the allegations of $3 million money laundering made by Khwaja Asif as rubbish, Imran said that the said amount was already mentioned in hospital's balance sheet. "If we had misused the money, we would not have mentioned it in our accounts, even it is available on website of the hospital," he maintained.
About the accusation that Zakat money given to SKMCH was invested abroad, Imran said that the hospital receives money from donors both inside and outside the country. "People from both in and outside Pakistan give their Zakat to the hospital [SKMCH] but that is not enough at all to give free treatment to the patients, so we organise fund raising events abroad to bridge the shortfall," he clarified.
He further explained that the foreign donations were collected in a dollar account which is managed by the hospital's endowment fund. "The endowment fund uses this money for investment and earn profit on it," he declared. The endowment fund has its own board which decides how to use the money, a board of which I'm not a member, he said, adding that the board decided to invest money in Dubai as property prices were rising then.
Answering the accusations one by one, the PTI chief said the money never went abroad from Pakistan as it was a part of the endowment fund and the company, where the hospital's endowment fund invested, was owned by Imtiaz Haideri, who is also the chief executive. "The investment crashed all of a sudden," Khan admitted, but, said, the owner had promised them that they will earn profit on the investment and will not incur losses.
The PTI chairman said the PML-N probably played this blame game now because it's Ramazan and the hospital receives huge amount of donations this time of the year. "Khawaja might be upset by this but I want to tell him that we have received Rs 40 million from Sialkot and raised Rs 60 million through a fund-raising Iftari in Lahore," Khan boasted.
The PTI chief added that Khawaja might have levelled the allegations just to prevent the hospital from getting funds, adding that PML-N has pulled such a stunt before as it has a track record of dirty politics. "In 1997, I had to face a lot of trouble. I had to tour all over the world to raise funds for the hospital as donations stopped coming in after PML-N created similar doubts...but I want to tell them [PML-N] that they can not harm the hospital how hard they try as it enjoys a good reputation across the globe," he maintained.
Comments
Comments are closed.