LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz Sharif has launched the ‘Suthra Punjab’ Programme with a target of cleaning the province in three months.
“The Punjab government was taking revolutionary steps to improve cleanliness in the province by starting the programme across the province; the government will ensure zero waste by cleaning roads and streets not only in cities but also in villages,” she said while addressing a launching ceremony of the ‘Suthra Punjab’ Programme on Tuesday.
She further said that the government was spending billions of rupees on this programme to make the province neat and clean. “The programme was creating job opportunities for over 100,000 people while the government purchased the latest machinery at a cost of billions of rupees,” she added.
She claimed that for the first time in Punjab, their government has brought a programme for uniform cleaning of cities and villages and under the programme; they would provide 21,000 modern machines and 80,000 equipments. She added that the government was building landfill sites in various villages and cities while the sanitation workers would get compensation under the minimum wage agreement.
While castigating the Pakistan tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)’s recent ‘violent protest’ in Islamabad, she said that there was a need to clean ‘political waste’ otherwise they would continue to set public properties on fire. She averred that during the November 24 protest, the people of Punjab ignored their final call and she saw only a small number of people coming out onto the streets across Punjab. “In the past, the PML-N held protests and our protestors did not damage public properties,” she added.
She lamented the PTI for resorting to violence whenever they announced protests, adding that the PTI attacked the federation and 170 policemen were injured during the PTI attack on the federation. Since 2014, the PTI never held a peaceful protest and warned that only peaceful protestors would be allowed to hold protests.
She accused the PTI of using foreign nationals to create unrest in Punjab and the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were not involved in the bloodshed and violence.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024