S Punjab Secretariat termed a joke

LAHORE:Rejecting the southern Punjab secretariat established by the PTI government, PML-N legislator Sardar Awais Khan Leghari termed it a joke with the people of the southern belt.

In his budget speech during the PA session on Friday, Sardar Awais Leghari, who is son of former President Sardar Farooq Leghari, and hails from DG Khan, the same area Chief Minister Usman Buzdar comes from, said the people of Southern Punjab believed that the government was making mockery of their issues. Leghari said that only in DG Khan District, four commissioners had been changed whereas in the province, four IGs, chief secretaries were changed which proved the failure of this government.

Awais Leghari said that it was PML-N that practically served the people of Southern Punjab while constructing motorways that reduced the 10-hour travel into six hours. He said the government had failed to protect crops from locust attack whereas it had made tall claims in the budget. The hospitals were short of facilities like ventilators and the education sector was ignored. He demanded the government tell the nation where had been the actual report of the sugar scam.

PPP Parliamentary leader in Punjab Assembly demanded increase in the salary of the government employees like the Sindh government had done. He said if the PM couldn't make his both ends meet in Rs200,000, how could a government servant meet his expenditures in a much thinner wage.

He stated it was the 18th Amendment that gave identity to the federating units. He said if the Punjab Chief Minister couldn't get the right of this province from Centre, he was guilty and answerable to this House.

Syed Hassan Murtaza pressed the government to explain its performance and tell where did it spend Rs245 billion loan it had sought so far. He said the same PTI government within one year had increased the budget of CM House by Rs190 million. Muavya Azam Tariq, Parliamentary head of Rah-e-Haq Party and MPA elected from Jhang, said health and precautionary measures were being advised to seek protection from corona.

PML-N Minority MPA Khalil Tahir Sindhu said that around 1,250 citizens had been terminated from jobs whereas Supreme Court had issued instructions that nobody should be deprived of job.

Moreover, Syed Yawar Bokhari of PTI in his speech hailed the project of PKLI established in the era of Shahbaz Sharif and stated the steps that need praise must be acknowledged. Saadia Suhail Rana of PTI said the government had come up with a public friendly and balanced vision for the year 2020-21. She said the government deserved praise for presenting such a budget in the given circumstances.