Accountability process: government won't show any flexibility: Firdous

Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Information and Broadcasting Dr Firdous Ashiq Awan has said that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government will not show any flexibility in the process of fair and transparent accountability.

Addressing a press conference here on Thursday, Dr Firdous reiterated that the government is committed to bringing back looted money from abroad while ensuring that the government will not take a step back in this regard.

The special assistant maintained that the incumbent government believes in rule of law and supremacy of Constitution, adding that they will not compromise on ongoing accountability process in the country at any cost.

She said that they will bring change in the country by recovering money looted from the national exchequer and by ensuring even-handed and transparent accountability.

Lashing out at the previous PML-N government, Dr Firdous said that the past government had put an additional burden of Rs 4.5 billion on domestic consumers through LNG contract. She urged the Parliament to play its due role for the welfare of the common man. She added former prime minister Nawaz Sharif will have to answer to questions with regard to irregularities of Rs 108 billion and Rs 4.5 billion of additional amount received from the consumers.

While condemning the incident took place at Punjab Institute of Cardiology, the special assistant said that the "footprints of PIC incident lead to a political party", adding that the activists of the PML-N turned the lawyers' protest violent. She said on one side there were lawyers and on the other side there were doctors, and due to both sides patients had to suffer.

She said the Punjab government should inquire and punish those involved in the incident as per law. She said Prime Minister Imran Khan and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) core committee have strongly condemned the lawyers' attack and rampage at Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC).

The core committee has declared that zero tolerance against such violence mongers should be observed at public departments, providing facilities to the general public, the SAPM said.

The core committee has decided that the party leadership should start coordinating with the local lawyers bodies, advocates associated with PTI, lawyers associations and bar councils and also take the apex judiciary into confidence for robust policy making to discourage such "law-abettors" in the lawyers community, she added.

"The recommendations of the committee meeting would be sent to Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan where we have our coalition governments for their implementation to relieve the masses from increasing price of goods at the grass roots level," she added. A clear and transparent policy would be notified in this regard whereas the lawyers' fraternity should pinpoint and terminate such black sheep from the bar councils, Firdous said.

She added that the entire lawyer community should not be blamed for such heinous violation of law as the miscreants were merely a handful who would be identified from the camera footages and punished in accordance with law.

The SAPM said that inflation remained the hot topic in the core committee meeting where a detailed discussion was made where the members presented various proposals to control price hike in the markets. Firdous said the Prime Ministers and the core committee focused on four key agenda items including inflation that have put serious burden on the masses and initiated a crisis in the country.

She said in the core committee meeting of party, it was discussed how to reduce the role of middleman. She said the PM has directed to devise an automation process in this regard. She said the ministry has submitted a proposal to the PM Imran Khan to convert social media cell into a wing. She said this restructuring would open new opportunities for the IT experts and those with good communication skills which will be utilized in this digital media wing.