Addresses public gathering in Kasur n Says Imran Niazi met divine justice for filing false cases against opposition leaders n A total of 1,000 transplants successfully performed at Pakistan Kidney and Liver Institute.

 

KASUR/LAHORE   -   Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif Sun­day said that his elder brother Nawaz Sharif would be the next prime min­ister of Pakistan and would change destiny of the country by initiating projects in the sectors of agriculture, industry and infrastructure.

PM Shehbaz stated this while ad­dressing a public meeting in Ka­sur after laying foundation stone for Taray Garh interchange on the La­hore-Bahawalnagar motorway and Rai Mansab Ali Khan interchange on Abdul Hakim motorway on the Bu­cheki-Nankana road.

"Nawaz Sharif will serve the peo­ple of Pakistan as prime minister for another term if voted to power. He considers the whole of Pakistan as his family and in the past selflessly served the people," he remarked.

He said Rs 263 billion would be spent on the construction of motor­way from Lahore to Bahawalnagar and on other projects. He recalled that in the past, Pakistan suffered from load-shedding of 20 hours ev­ery day and then Nawaz Sharif came in 2013 and he removed the dark­ness caused by power shortages by setting up power projects, revived in­dustry and agriculture and brought the CPEC project of $ 30 billion with the collaboration of China.

He said their government provided laptops worth billions of rupees to millions of students, adding he was unfairly criticised for delivering lap­tops to youth who were now using modern tools of communication and earning livelihoods. He noted that Nawaz Sharif initiated the proj­ect of Diamer Bhasha and Dasu dams and made Pakistan a nucle­ar state by conducting six nucle­ar explosions in response to five explosions by India. He reminded that Nawaz Sharif rejected the of­fer of $ five billion by the then US President Bill Clinton and went on with the nuclear explosions while ignoring pressure. Nawaz Sharif also started Zarb e Azab led by Pakistan army to eradi­cate terrorism and the jawans of armed forces and people from all sections of society rendered sac­rifices against terrorism.

Shehbaz Sharif said unfortu­nately terrorists were again al­lowed to re-enter Pakistan and they took many innocent lives in terrorist acts. In the era of Nawaz Sharif, the PM said Pa­kistan had good relations with friendly and brotherly countries including China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Turkey, Qatar and others.

Then Imran Niazi was im­posed on the country after rigged election in 2018 and his regime caused severe damage to relations with these coun­tries including Islamic countries and he resorted to baseless al­legations of corruption against companies of China, he added.

Ties with China were broken by the former government of Imran Niazi despite the fact that the neighbouring country mas­sively invested in infrastructure, power and road projects, he pointed out. The prime minister said former judge Saqib Nisar and other co-conspirators oust­ed Nawaz Sharif on the basis of residence permit even when his name was not among the 400 persons named in the Panama papers. Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz ap­peared before the court 100 times in their cases and did not evade arrests as was later done by Imran Niazi who presented a fake receipt for an expensive watch imprinted with a mod­el of Khana-e-Kaaba and came in court with a “bucket on his head”, he added. He said those who filed false and concocted cases against opposition lead­ers now met divine justice.

He said in the tenure of Imran Niazi, several cases of corrup­tion surfaced including wheat and sugar scams in which mon­ey was minted by unnecessary export and import of these com­modities and then these acts of fraud were never probed and citizens bore the burden of loot and plunder. He said his gov­ernment faced unprecedent­ed challenges of inflation and devastating floods. “My govern­ment distributed Rs100 billion among the flood affectees and several hundreds of billions are still required for their rehabili­tation.” He said due to his gov­ernment’s policies and distri­bution of seeds and fertilizer on lower rates, bumper wheat was produced while cotton pro­duction this year would also be at record levels. “My govern­ment saved the country from default and from difficult eco­nomic conditions, unemploy­ment and price hikes by signing the agreement with the Inter­national Monetary Fund.”

He said reasons of current in­flation were war in Ukraine and rising international commodi­ty and fuel prices, adding due to the mismanagement of the past government, his government had to sign agreement with IMF despite its tough conditions. 

Saudi Arabia gave $ two bil­lion, UAE $ one billion and China rescheduled loans of $ five bil­lion so that Pakistan could meet the financing needs for finalis­ing the IMF agreement, he in­formed. He said as chief minister he served the people of Punjab with sincerity, undertook mas­sive projects in health and ed­ucation sectors, built road net­work in the province and gave free medicine to people.

He vowed that their next gov­ernment would bring revolution in the agriculture sector, extract minerals worth billions of dol­lars and equip youth with latest tools of information technology. The youth programme would be implemented at the federal and provincial levels and more lap­tops would be given to the stu­dents on merit. He lamented that billions of rupees were wasted on unnecessary court cases in­stead of a focus on mineral ex­traction in the provinces. He told that the National Assembly would be dissolved on August 9 and a caretaker government would be formed. He prayed for the departed souls who lost their lives in the train accident during the day and after sinking of a boat in Head Sulemanki.

Earlier, the prime minister was given detailed briefing on the new infrastructure projects. Governor Punjab Balighur Reh­man and legislators of Pakistan Muslim League(N) accompa­nied the prime minister.

Serving ailing humanity; a col­lective responsibility of all: PM

Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif on Sunday said that all those who were tasked with the onus to serve humani­ty, should strive for the provision of free-of-cost health and educa­tion facilities to the poor and de­prived segments of society. The prime minister was addressing a conference arranged here to cre­ate awareness about the elimi­nation of Hepatitis-C in the coun­try arranged at Pakistan Kidney and Liver Institute (PKLI). Ad­dressing the participants, the prime minister said it was their collective responsibility to serve the poor and deprived masses by setting up health facilities like the PKLI in line with the vision of Quaid e Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of the nation, and in accordance with the con­cept of the welfare state.

The event was attended by Governor Punjab Muhammad Balighur Rehman, ministers, ex­perts and relevant authorities. The prime minister termed the event a historic and said that he always desired to see PKLI work­ing on the pattern of Johns Hop­kins of the USA. He said the PKLI journey started in 2014, when he requested Dr Saeed Akhtar to set up a state-of-the-art insti­tute for the kidney and liver dis­eases in Punjab province. The prime minister said that the in­stitute was established with an autonomous body to rid it of any official red tape. The proj­ect was launched in 2015 and was completed in 2018 when the first kidney transplant was performed, he recollected. The prime minister said that till this day, a total of 1000 transplants had been performed at PKLI which was another milestone.

The PKLI had now Rs 15 bil­lion in the trust fund which would help in providing free treatment to the poor people, he added. He observed that pre­viously, they used to send liver disease patients to other neigh­bouring countries. PKLI was es­tablished in the country which entertained patients irrespec­tive of class and without dis­crimination, he said, adding it was also an essence for the creation of Pakistan for which Quaid and a large number of people gave huge sacrifices.

He regretted that the poor people in the country suffered while the rich had all the re­sources to get treatment for themselves at the best facilities in the world. The prime minis­ter said during 2018, about 26 Hepatitis C filter clinics were es­tablished in the province under the umbrella of PKLI where pa­tients were treated with great care and with free medicines.

That programme was subse­quently halted due to politics, but now these filter clinics again started functioning and treat­ment was being provided across the province, he added. About the Hepatitis C programme, the prime minister said that Rs35 billion fund was provided by the federal government on the basis of half percent contribution by the provincial governments.

Earlier, the prime minister launched the national Hepati­tis C elimination programme and performed groundbreaking of PKLI University. Speaking on the occasion, Governor Punjab Muhammad Balighur Rehman said today, was a momentous day in the health and educa­tion sectors of the country as the prime minister would be in­augurating PKLI University and Hepatitis C Elimination Initia­tive. The health and education sectors always witnessed prog­ress during the governments of PML-N which established a vast network of different renowned institutions, he added. The gov­ernor also expressed concerns over a number of out of school children in the country.

Professor Dr Saeed Akhtar, in his remarks, said that they were successful in setting up an infor­mation-based system leading to a center of excellence to serve the ailing and poor segments of society. Despite, Covid-19 pandemic, the institute per­formed thousands of surgeries and transplants and achieved a milestone of 1000 such surger­ies and transplants, he added.

PKLI had served over 3.5 mil­lion patient interactions since its inception in December 2017. More than 2 million patient in­teractions had been served at PKLI hospital in a short span of time. Over 1.5 million patient visits for Hepatitis relief have been served under the Hepatitis Prevention and Treatment Pro­gramme (HPTP) since its launch till June 2019.

‘LANDSCAPING WORK AT PKLI’S ENTRANCE’

Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif on Sunday ap­preciated the landscaping work of Lahore Development Author­ity (LDA), under the supervi­sion of Caretaker Punjab Chief Minister Syed Mohsin Naqvi, at Pakistan Kidney and Liver Insti­tute (PKLI). On his Twitter han­dle, the prime minister shared his thoughts along with a com­bo of pictures of the entrance of PKLI. “A breathtaking view of the landscape adorning the en­trance to the Pakistan Kidney and Liver Institute (PKLI). Pub­lic places, especially hospitals, should wear a friendly look,” he posted in a tweet.