Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) senior leader Ahsan Iqbal on Wednesday called upon Chief of the Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa to be aware of the 'misleading' information given to him by ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), insisting the government's 'flawed' economic policies have put the economy on destruction and posed a serious threat to national security.
Speaking at a news conference along with senior party leaders including former speaker National Assembly Ayaz Sadiq, Mushahidullah Khan, Marriyum Aurangzeb and Musaddik Malik, Ahsan Iqbal said the Army Chief and other institutions should review their complete reliance on the information provided by the government economic team.
"We have a great regard for General Bajwa who played very important role in bringing investment in Pakistan from the friendly countries. But I request him [Bajwa] and other institutions to recheck their information about the country's economy, as they are being given misleading information about the economy," he alleged, adding that the national security greatly depends on the economy.
"I am going to say this with full responsibility that this government has put the country's economy on destruction, as they have no policy, no vision and no way out to deal with the melting economy," Ahsan maintained, adding, "Khan's economics is the policy of destruction of Pakistan's economy."
Sharing the past week figures quoted in various media reports, he said that there has been decline in contracts in construction sector and textile exports, sea food exports downed by 3 percent, the government missed export targets by wide margin, the stock market is on decline every week, foreign direct investment declined by 50 percent, tax revenue target has been missed by Rs600 billion, GDP shrunk to 3.3 percent, manufacturing sector declined to 3 percent, prices of fertilizers have increased and policy rate has increased to the historic highest 13.25 percent.
He said 250,000 people have lost their jobs in automobile sector and around 0.6 million have lost their jobs due to slash in development budget, adding that around one million people have become jobless in the last one year.
He further alleged that the PTI government has virtually frozen the projects under China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), saying that the ML-I Railways project, which was supposed to be started this year, could not proceed because of the slash in the funding to the project.
He further maintained that State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has stated that decline in current account deficit was result of the completion of CPEC's first phase projects and due to the completion of energy projects under the CPEC.
Resembling Imran Khan with the last leader of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev, the PML-N leader maintained that the prime minister has no understanding of the reforms he has been promising with the nation.
"He [Khan] has proved to be 'Gorbachev' for the country whose reform policies resulted in an end to the Soviet Union and now he [Khan] is on the path to become Hitler," he further maintained, adding that opponents are being intimidated and their right to freedom of speech and freedom of association is being restricted.
He cautioned that the federation will have to face serious problems if there was any attempt to undermine the Constitution and the democratic process in the country. "Don't threaten us with the arrests... we are all ready to pay any price in this struggle for the freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of media and against any censorship of the opposition leaders," he said.
He further said PML-N workers are being arrested who participated in the rally led by Maryam Nawaz.
Ahsan Iqbal further said PML-N together with other opposition political parties will mark July 25 as the 'black day' today (Thursday) in all major cities to lodge protest over the alleged rigged general elections held a year ago on this day, the party leaders said.
He said the day will be marked as 'black day' in all major cities including Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, Quetta and other cities on part of the opposition's anti-government drive.
"We would observe July 25 as 'black day' as mark of protest because this day will not be forgotten when mandate of the people was stolen and a 'selected' prime minister was imposed on them... we will mark this day to show the world that he [Imran Khan] is not elected but a 'selected' prime minister...we believe that this 'artificial' system cannot be long-lasting," he said.
Speaking on the occasion, Mushahidullah Khan referred to Prime Minister Khan's interview with the US TV channel in which he stated that Pakistan's ISI led CIA killing al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, saying that this was for the first time when a head of the government is making such a revelation through a pubic statement which needs explanation.