Niazi Sahib will have to be answerable for his baseless charges, says Shahbaz

LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif on Friday inaugurated the 100-bed Tehsil Headquarters (THQ) Hospital, Manawan. The CM went to different wards and checked the quality of medical facilities being provided to patients. People told the CM the good treatment facilities were being offered to them and medicines were available in hospital free-of-cost. The CM told the ceremony the hospital had been established through public-private partnership.

He said due to continuous struggle of the Punjab government, sufficient improvements had been brought about in the health sector and the situation was better than the past now. “I shall not sit idle till the people are not provided international level healthcare facilities.”

He said when he was elected as the Khadim of the people in Punjab in 1997, then he decided to transform the hospitals as the best service providers to the ailing humanity. Unluckily, democracy was hijacked which ruined the system. He said the Punjab government had provided all the resources for hospitals, while the management was maintained by the Indus Trust, led by Dr Abdul Bari and this trust was also running the Government Recep Tayyip Erdogan Hospital in Muzaffargarh.

“I have visited the Multan Kidney Centre and found some slip ups there as the situation was not satisfactory. I am responsible to Almighty Allah as well and if any injustice is done with anybody, then I am ready to seek pardon. “We should learn to call a spade a spade and due to failure to adopt this social behaviour, Pakistan is lost in the darkness for the last 70 years. “If the 21 crore people of Pakistan could succeed in devising a system to call a spade a spade, then Pakistan shall be transformed as an epitome of Islamic welfare state envisioned by Quaid-e-Azam and Iqbal.”

He said the elements criticising the public welfare initiatives were not well-wishers of the people. Some used to level baseless allegations that no work was being done in the healthcare sector in Punjab as PML-N was fond of constructing metro and roads.

“You levelled baseless allegations and we have replied by constructing such a wonderful hospital. You have failed to improve the healthcare in your own province and also not succeeded in launching the metro service. When dengue attacked there, then you did not respond to the goodwill gesture of the Punjab government and rather, escaped to the mountains by leaving the patients in the lurch in Peshawar and announced that dengue would be automatically eliminated in the winter season. “I have approached the courts against him (Imran Khan) and by the grace of Almighty Allah, the time will come when Niazi Sahib will have to give reply for his baseless allegations. “You should prove your allegations in the court of law; otherwise, you are the chief of liars in the real sense.”   While announcing provision of CT scan machine for the Manawan Hospital, the CM congratulated all concerned.

Indus Health Network CEO Dr Abdul Bari said in his address the foundation of the third hospital had been laid between Punjab government and the Indus Hospital. Provincial ministers Kh Salman Rafique, Kh Imran Nazir, members of the assembly, health secretaries, CEO of Indus Health Network Dr Abdul Bari, Mian Muhammad Ahsan and a large number of people attended the ceremony.

Meanwhile, Shahbaz chaired a high-level meeting and reviewed the progress on the continuing programme of modernising the system of drug testing labs. Senior officials of the UK based LGC Lab gave a briefing about this ongoing programme aimed at modernising the drug testing labs. He said that state-of-the-art drug testing lab is working in Lahore while such labs situated in Rawalpindi, Multan, Faisalabad and Bahawalpur are also being developed according to the international standards. Meanwhile, Punjab CM Shahbaz Sharif expressed deep sense of sorrow over the death of Maj (retd) Riffat Hayat Daha, former MNA and ambassador.