ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan did not appear to be in a mood to spare anyone on Monday. Fresh from a vacation in London with his sons, Mr Khan took his political adversaries as well as violators of party discipline to task.

Addressing a press conference at his Bani Gala residence, the PTI chief indirectly asked the military leadership to take its ongoing anti-corruption campaign to Punjab where, he claimed, the “biggest-ever robbery is being committed in the name of mega projects by the ruling PML-N”.

He said that since so much had been said about the Nandipur power project and there had been criticism of the exorbitant cost of the Islamabad metro bus project, “the PTI demands a third party audit by some company of international repute”.

Mr Khan was happy over what he called the end of reconciliation between PPP Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif as a result of successes of the Rangers-led operation in Karachi against criminals.

Expels Ziaullah Afridi from PTI

“The moment close associates of Mr Zardari and MQM leaders have been nabbed in corruption cases, the two parties have started crying in the name of democracy, pressurising Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to come to their rescue. The irony for the PML-N government is that if it favours Mr Zardari and MQM against Sindh Rangers it will be targeted as supporters of corruption,” he said.

The PTI chief said that because of recent arrests in Sindh, the PPP had started talking about alleged cases of corruption committed by the federal government such as the LNG import, Islamabad metro bus project, etc, “otherwise, they were happy with a highly compromised National Accountability Bureau and Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly, whose heads have been chosen as a result of their mutual muk-muka”.

Mr Khan, who recently visited Sindh, said the people of the province in general and Karachi in particular were extremely happy with the arrest of corrupt people as peace was fast returning to the city. Besides demanding a similar operation in Lahore (Punjab), “I invite Rangers to come to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and conduct scrutiny of the PTI’s provincial government”, he said.

He said that while PML-N leaders were busy making money in the name of major development projects, Mr Zardari was wasting public money by convening Sindh cabinet meetings in Dubai.

ACTION AGAINST PTI LEADERS: Furious over what he called lack of discipline in the party, the PTI chief announced expulsion of Ziaullah Afridi, KP lawmaker and former minister for mines, who is currently facing charges of corruption. “I am hurt what Mr Afridi has recently said in the KP Assembly and left with no option but to shun him out of the party.”

Mr Afridi had accused the KP chief minister and provincial ministers of being involved in corruption and also claimed that the provincial police chief had been compromised.

“At a time when the entire country is praising the KP police for being apolitical, Mr Afridi is blaming it for politicisation. And why Mr Afridi is saying all this when he himself is facing charges of corruption,” the PTI chief said.

He said senior party leader Senator Azam Swati, along with an MPA and an MNA, had been put on notice for violating party discipline in the KP local government elections and, if found guilty, they would also be shown the doors.

Mr Khan admitted that party tickets in KP had been distributed on the basis of family connections and said: “As far as party discipline is concerned, I will enforce it, come what may, and in future no family member of a party lawmaker will be awarded tickets until cleared by the party’s boards.”

Published in Dawn, September 15th, 2015

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