QWP says sovereignty surrendered to IMF

PESHAWAR: Qaumi Watan Party (QWP) leader Sikandar Hayat Khan Sherpao said on Monday that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government had mortgaged the sovereignty of the nation with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as it had resorted to anti-people policies to obtain loans.

According to a press release, he said the rulers compromised the country’s interests for nominal economic gains. “The government must share with the public the strings and conditions attached with the IMF’s bailout package,” he demanded. Sikandar Sherpao recalled that the PTI leader Prime Minister Imran Khan had said in the past that he would prefer suicide to seeking financial assistance from the IMF, but now the government was jubilant over its agreement for a loan with the money-lending institution. The QWP leader said the rulers had handed over the affairs of the country to the IMF. He said that tough conditions attached with foreign loans always added to the woes of the poor through the imposition of new taxes and increased in prices of essential commodities, gas and electricity.

“It would trigger a fresh wave of inflation that will badly hit the people from the downtrodden segments of the society,” he feared. The QWP leader said the PTI rulers lacked the ability to run the country. “The government has appointed an IMF economist as the governor of the State Bank of Pakistan which has proven that fact that the PTI leaders are totally incompetent who have surrendered their authority to IMF to run the country’s economic affairs,” he maintained. He said the financial managers of the government could not turn the economy around as per their claims and instead left the country at the mercy of the international financial institutions.