BUNER: Former prime minister and Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf chairman Imran Khan on Friday alleged that top leaders of the ruling coalition in the centre Nawaz Sharif of the PML-N and Asif Zardari of the PPP wanted to eliminate him from politics over ‘high treason’.

“The two most corrupt [former rulers of the country], who looted the country for 30 years, parked their illicit wealth in foreign banks and were convicted by the courts, are trying to get rid of me through a case of high treason. I want to make it clear to them that I am not the one, who will surrender to the imported government or any superpower,” the former premier told a gathering of his party’s workers here on Friday.

Provincial Chief Minister Mahmood Khan, former defence minister Pervez Khattak, aide to the former prime minister Shahbaz Gill and local MNAs and MPAs also attended the event.

Mr Imran alleged that leaders of the Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif-led coalition wanted to get corruption cases against them quashed.

PTI chief says won’t surrender to ‘imported’ govt

“They (Zardari and Sharif) want to introduce a system of governance, where only small thieves are punished, while the big thieves get off scot-free. We, the patriotic citizens, have to fight against them and that system,” he said.

The former prime minister also accused the federal government of planning to rig the next general polls with the connivance of the Election Commission of Pakistan.

He said the ‘imported’ government had subjected PTI workers to unprecedented oppression during their recent Azadi March on Islamabad.

“Such cruelty hasn’t happened even in the India-held Kashmir. I found out about it the day after our protest ended,” he said.

Mr Imran said the people should rise against that oppression and if they didn’t do it, their children would suffer.

He said he called off the Azadi March after consulting his lawyers over the Supreme Court directions about it.

The former prime minister said he had never been scared of the corrupt and would prefer rendering his life to yielding to them.

He said India, Israel and the US were opposed to a strong Pakistan and therefore, they hatched a conspiracy against his government to weaken the country.

Mr Imran said the Indian TV channels and newspapers celebrated his ouster as the prime minister. He claimed that the ruling Sharif family had strong ties with the Indian business community.

The former prime minister said the International Monetary Fund had pressured the last PTI government to increase oil prices but instead, the latter reduced those rates to the people’s relief.

“Our [PTI] government protected the people from inflation but the slaves of the United States, who are now ruling the country, hurled petrol bomb at them by hiking prices,” he said.

Mr Imran said the ‘imported’ government was blindly following the IMF’s ‘orders’.

He said had his government not been ousted, he would have said ‘absolutely not’ to the IMF.

In a veiled reference to the security establishment, the former prime minister asked ‘neutrals’ if the national security and integrity was not important.

“I had warned them [neutrals] there would be a huge economic setback if the conspiracy against my government succeeded,” he said.

The former prime minister said whenever Pakistani currency devalued, the wealth of Sharifs increased.

He said as the prime minister, he didn’t make personal visits abroad.

Mr Imran asked the residents of Buner to respond well to his call to fight for the country’s real independence.

Published in Dawn, June 4th, 2022