FAISALABAD: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister for Political Communication Dr Shahbaz Gill on Sunday said that the second-tier leadership of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) had given a crushing defeat to opposition parties in elections of Senate, Gilgit-Baltistan, and Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJK).

He said Prime Minister Imran Khan would personally lead the campaign in the general elections 2023 and PTI would make a clean sweep throughout Pakistan.

Speaking at a press conference in Gattwala, he said the PDM power show in Karachi would fizzle out like its previous protests between 2018 and 2020.

He said the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) which was demanding Prime Minister Imran Khan’s resignation had failed to achieve its objective as it had deviated from playing the role of a strong opposition.

Says Imran will lead PTI to landslide win in 2023 elections

He said the PTI, being a truly elected government, wanted to take the opposition on board so that a collective national agenda could be implemented for the welfare of the masses.

He said that opposition actually wanted only NRO and it was unwilling to play its democratic role.

He lamented that Maulana Fazlur Rehman, despite being a religious scholar, was telling a lie to the people. Initially, he (Fazl) had demanded resignation of Mr Khan, but later the JUI-F leader abandoned his move as his sponsors failed to provide him financial support.

He said that Maryam Nawaz was harping on the mantra of women’s rights but “we believe that our beloved holy Prophet Hazrat Muhammad (peace be upon him) gave rights to women about 1,400 years ago and the PTI government’s struggle is meant to transform Pakistan into a true Islamic welfare state”.

He said the so-called champion of women’s rights was part of the PDM that denied women the right to participate in a rally.

He said that statements of Maulana Fazlur Rehman and Nawaz Sharif against women were on record and Ms Maryam should resign from politics keeping in mind these statements.

Mr Gill said that after the rise of PTI, the PML-N had become a GT Road party while PPP had been confined to Sindh province. However, he said that although the PPP and PML-N were still much bigger parties as compared to JUI-F, the two parties had been following the dictation of a smaller party in the so-called political struggle.

He said the PML-N had announced that it would not oppose the PPP, but a statement from PDM clearly indicated that the PPP had stabbed the PDM in the back.

He said Mr Khan would never make a deal with these corrupt elements and would prefer to send them to jail.

The special assistant to the PM said the PTI had not only contained coronavirus, but it had also put the national economy on the right track.

Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2021