Leasing out Radio Pakistan will be stopped at all costs: Marriyum

LAHORE: PML-N Central spokesperson and former information minister Marriyum Aurangzeb has said the government’s destructive aspirations regarding leasing out the symbol of national pride Radio Pakistan would be stopped at all costs for which the party will raise this issue at all forums including the National Assembly.

Addressing the employees of Radio Pakistan who were protesting against government’s proposal of leasing out the institution, she said Radio Pakistan is the celebrated platform that announced the creation of Pakistan, disowning it would not be allowed at any cost.

The PTI, she said is so incompetent that they cannot even run a scrap-dealer’s stall but they had been gifted the country’s reins. She said those who attacked august Parliament and Supreme Court, the foundation symbols of the country, can never understand the significance of Radio Pakistan.

The former information minister said the PTI made tall claims of solving every crisis of the country yet they couldn’t find a way to find a solution that would retain one building of Radio Pakistan; the PML-N will not allow selling Radio Pakistan and other national assets that are signature symbols of national pride.

“Pakistan is a country, not a scrap-dealer’s stall or OLX, where everything has been put on sale at the government’s whims; we would not allow anyone to run the country in this fashion,” she added. Marriyum stressed that PTI government needed to understand that leasing/selling out an institution is not institutional reforms. In fact these depict failure and incapability of the government to introduce reforms. Constructive reforms are aimed at retaining assets while working out a strategy that would benefit the institution and its employees, she added.

She said real reforms addressing the core issues need to be brought in to rid the institutions of their problems, instead of getting rid of the institutions altogether.

Talking about these reforms, she was of the view that all institutions of ministry of information should be integrated and the government should house all the departments of the ministry that are in rented buildings into buildings like Radio Pakistan.