Elahi asks Punjab CM to apologise over delay in surgical tower

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League (PML-Q) senior leader Ch Pervaiz Elahi has said that he had started the Mayo Hospital surgical tower in 2006 and during his tenure it had been completed in all respects but as Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif came in 2008, he did not allow it to be functional.

In a statement, Pervaiz Elahi said that Shahbaz Sharif was not ready to make the surgical tower functional even now but thanks to Pakistan Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar, who took sou motu notice of miserable conditions of hospitals in Punjab and also remarked that why mega health projects like the surgical tower of Pervaiz Elahi government were not being allowed to be functional although they were complete.

He said that under Shahbaz’s negative mentality he kept stopping funds for the project on one or the other excuse and if for show-off some funds were allocated, they were misappropriated and transferred to the "jangla" bus and metro train. "He played for ten years with the lives of patients. Thousands of lives could have been saved had the surgical tower become functional timely. Shahbaz Sharif should tender apology to the nation for keeping the surgical tower closed for ten years," he added.

"I hope that after the surgical tower, he will also get Wazirabad Cardiology Hospital functional and earn good wishes of poor patients. Wazirabad Cardiology Hospital is also practically closed for the last ten years due to Shahbaz Sharif and waiting for some messiah like the chief justice. So far about 6,000 heart patients have lost their lives for not getting timely medical help and the grave situation still persists. Like the Mayo Hospital surgical tower, the crime of Wazirabad Cardiology Hospital is that I had built it," he added.