LAHORE: Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif on Friday hit out at the opponents and a section of the media for, what he said, promoting a culture of false, baseless and negative propaganda and portraying Pakistan as a failed state.

“I respect some news channels for discussing various issues very carefully and with responsibility. But a section of the media is promoting a dangerous culture of talks based on deceit and disrupting the right direction of the nation,” the chief minister deplored at the contract-signing ceremony of 1,263MW RLNG power project.

“Today I am talking to you directly. You continued propagating that Sharif brothers have been doing corruption and they don’t do any project without taking commission. But let me tell you that wrong and biased comments have failed to prove corruption of even a single penny against us,” he said.

The CM also reminded the media of various power-sector scandals of the past. “Why have you forgotten the scams of rental power, Nandipur project machinery and delaying Diamer-Basha Dam project for 10 years. For this dam we acquired land worth Rs100 billion. And we launched work on the Dasu dam project,” he said and requested the media to show truth to the nation rather than misguiding it and leading it to the path to destruction.

“If the media cannot show truth, it should at least avoid falsehood. Everyone knows that during the last four years, the PML-N government under the leadership of Nawaz Sharif has done a lot in the power sector.

“Will you like to tell the nation how much the PML-N government worked for the power sector like ghosts and giants in the last four years. Have you found any such precedent in the last 70 years?” he asked, and again pleaded, “don’t give me credit but you must tell truth to the nation at least.”

He also berated the PTI chief who, he said, was in the habit of giving wrong notions to people.

Published in Dawn, September 30th, 2017