KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples Party chairman Bilawal-Bhutto Zardari claimed on Thursday that he and his party had solutions to the crises being faced by Pakistan while asking Prime Minister Imran Khan to quit after he had publicly conceded defeat against the national challenges and vowed that with the public support the PPP could bring the country out of every kind of emergency.

Addressing the groundbreaking ceremony of Malir Expressway being built by the Sindh government under the public-private partnership model, the PPP chairman in a jibe targeted the PM for his recent statement in which he had said that a new government should not assume power without proper homework.

“After more than two years, we came to know that you are under training,” he said, making the ceremony burst into laughter. “This government is in its third year of governance and we are told that the PM is under training.”

The PPP chairman also asked about the performance and experience of the PTI government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa since 2013, wondering that the seven-year governance in a province had failed to train a party which came into being more than two decades ago.

“Is this a kind of joke?” Mr Bhutto-Zardari said. “Yes this is a joke. This is a joke with the people of Pakistan.”

Rs27.58bn Malir Expressway project launched, to be completed in 30 months

He then referred to the crises being faced by the PPP government when it came into power in 2008 and “it took up each and every challenge to resolve them one by one”.

“It [PTI] is the first government and first PM of its kind who responds to every crisis with a question — ‘What can I do?’” he said. “This is a perfect example of lack of capacity and incompetence.”

He said his party while enjoying strong roots among the people and support of every segment of society still believed it could bring the country out of the recent crises. In the same breath, he came up with advice for the PM.

“Just resign and go home. Let the people take up the challenge of these crises and we are confident that once the competent government is there, our Pakistan can come out of every crisis,” he added.

Malir Expressway project

Earlier, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah briefed the ceremony on the Malir Expressway project, which would be the biggest civic infrastructure project ever done by any provincial government in Pakistan under the public-private partnership mode.

He said the expressway would be built as an access-controlled 38.5km-long high-speed toll expressway to connect the city centre in Karachi to M-9 Motorway between Karachi and Hyderabad.

“The six-lane highway project having a cost of Rs27.58 billion will be completed in 30 months,” he said. “The project will have six interchanges. I remember in 2009 or 2010 then president Asif Ali Zardari had advised the Sindh government to involve the private sector in doing a mega development project. Then Sindh became the first province to execute that model and today we are achieving the targets due to timely decisions.”

Published in Dawn, December 25th, 2020