PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz on Wednesday demanded a judicial commission to probe startling claims made by former DG FIA Bashir Memon.
A day earlier, Memon had claimed in a private TV channel programme that Prime Minister Imran Khan had pressurised him to book Justice Qazi Faez Isa and opposition leaders in different cases.
“Never before in Pakistan’s history has a sitting prime minister, regardless of whether he is fake or an imposed one, been involved in such serious crimes,” she said, referring to former DG FIA Bashir Memon’s allegations. “I am sure now people know what Sicilian Mafias are,” she said, referring to a taunt often used by the government for the PML-N leadership. “Not even gangs and mafias commit the acts that are being committed from the Prime Minister House,” she further said.
She quoted Memon’s remarks in which he alleged the prime minister had asked him to file cases against Nawaz Sharif and Maryam Nawaz. “You told them to first arrest [opposition leaders] and later check what charges can be filed against them,” she said, referring to the premier. “Never in the [country’s] history have such heinous crimes been committed from inside the PM House,” she said, adding that, “Chiefs of institutions are summoned and asked to frame cases [against opposition leaders].”
Maryam accused the prime minister of being involved in ‘political engineering’, adding that Imran Khan is using the Prime Minister’s Office to threaten and pressurise heads of institutions. “The result [from the alleged witch hunt] is that Pakistan has been put to shame in front of the entire world,” she said. “You have turned into an epic failure on every front,” she added.
Maryam lauded Supreme Court’s Justice Faez Isa for ‘fighting back conspiracies’, observing that the rulers ‘achieved nothing but defeat’. She demanded the formation of a judicial commission to ‘investigate the conspiracy of a fake reference against the SC judge’.
“Imran Khan came to power after stealing votes, [and now] Pakistan is dealing with the miseries of lawlessness and unemployment,” Maryam said. “Pakistani passport and flights are being banned. There are piles of garbage in cities; there’s no such thing as governance in the country,” she raged on.
The PML-N leader further said that Imran Khan has failed, adding that the sooner the country gets rid of this government the better. “This is the fight of the people for their rights and to rid themselves of an ineligible and enforced government,” she added.
“What is your performance, what do you do first thing in the morning when you wake up? You tell people [heads of institutions] to make fake cases against this person or that or throw people into jails,” she said. “The PML-N will not let go of this [episode] easily,” she said. “This is a huge and very serious case. A conspiracy [that took place] over the past five years is hidden behind this case,” she said, and added that a conspiracy is being hatched against the PML-N, adding that it began from the 2014 sit-in staged by the PTI and has been continuing on since then.
In response to a question, Maryam said she would continue to fight Justice Qazi Faez Isa and Justice Shaukat Siddiqui’s battles and that she had been doing so from the time when the media was not even allowed to air content over the matter. She said the government was out to get Justice Isa owing to the verdict he gave in the Faizabad dharna case. She praised Justice Shaukat Siddiqui as well, wondering why the government was afraid of judges that were willing to uphold the truth. “If these judges hadn’t stood up, if they hadn’t fought and show courage [against the government], then no one would have remembered them today,” she said.
The PML-N leader said the government was being exposed while it is in power. She warned the prime minister, urging him to think about what will happen to him when he leaves office.
Maryam strongly condemned the arrest of PML-N leader Mian Javed Latif and said that he is being punished for speaking the truth.
