KARACHI: Facing serious criticism mainly over social media for using the premises of Sindh Governor House for a signing ceremony of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) of his son’s business venture a day before, President Arif Alvi on Tuesday admitted that it was ‘poor judgment’ on his part that led to such a situation.

He expressed the regret on twitter, where only a few hours ago he had posted a congratulatory message to his son, Awab, for entering into a business expansion understanding with a US organisation.

“For the signing ceremony of an MOU between @DrAwab and his friend in my presence, the venue selection was a matter of poor judgment,” he tweeted.

Only on Monday evening, President Alvi had not only extended good wishes and prayers to his dentist son, but also shared a photo of him signing a document with a representative of a US organisation.

His admission about the “poor judgment” came after a number of people ranging from common citizens to media celebrities and politicians to social media activists, questioned whether there was a conflict of interest in the president attending a private event that was also hosted at the official residence of the Sindh governor.

On Monday, the MoU for providing ‘affordable’ dental care to people in Pakistan across the country was signed between the president’s son Awab Alvi of the Alvi Dental Hospital and Dr Anas Athar of Bringing Smiles USA.

A picture tweeted by his son and shared by President Alvi also showed First Lady Samina Arif Alvi among the guests at the event.

Published in Dawn, December 1st, 2021

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