Ahsan dares PTI to prove even 32 paisa corruption

LAHORE: PMLN Secretary General Ahsan Iqbal on Sunday criticised the PTI-led government for accusing his party leadership of corruption and challenged them to prove even 32 paisas worth of corruption of the Rs3,200 billion the party has been accused of engaging in.

Addressing a press conference with PMLN leaders, Iqbal said: "A new scandal was created against me and Shehbaz Sharif yesterday, in which it was said that my brother was awarded contracts." He vowed to "fight the false cases".

Iqbal further stated that "there were no political prisoners in the PMLN era and no one was subject to political revenge". Iqbal said that it was the PMLN's mistake that no action was taken against Imran Khan and PTI in their time. He added that PTI leaders "should have been sent to jail and punished".

"The country's debt increased by more than Rs1 trillion, people are witnessing the worst inflation. "Who says that Imran Khan is honest?" Iqbal asked. He further stated that "Imran Khan is a patron of the mafia".

The PMLN leader proclaimed that he gives more income tax than the premier yet lives in a rented house. PMLN's spokesperson Marriyum Aurangzeb noted that after Lahore's National Accountability Bureau (NAB), now Rawalpindi's NAB has summoned the PMLN leadership. "This is a corrupt gang whose patron is Imran Khan," Aurangzeb said.

She questioned why the mastermind behind projects worth Rs3.3 trillion has been accused of planting 4.5 million saplings.

"The NAB-Niazi nexus can not prove a penny's worth of corruption," she claimed. Discussing the performance of PTI, Aurangzeb said that Lahore is "barren" and Punjab has been turned into a "heap of garbage".

Aurangzeb further said: "Those who sold off the country are looking into contracts given by Shahbaz Sharif to Ahsan Iqbal's brother." She added that those who fill the pockets of the "mafia" are rewarded and "after the NAB-Niazi nexus, an Imran-FIA nexus has been established".

Aurangzeb said that in the last three years, NAB, Imran Khan, and Shahzad Akbar all tried to prove corruption allegations against PML-N leaders but none were successful. Following the statements by PMLN leaders, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Political Communication Shahbaz Gill released a video response.

Gill said that Marriyum Aurangzeb is saying that the PML-N was called out for "only 450 million rupees". "Did the 450 million belong to someone's father? Did they [the PML-N leadership] bring the money from home that they cannot be questioned?" Gill asked.

He added that the "Nawaz Sharif mindset" is still prevelant today. Gill alleged that the "work of a gardener" was given to Ahsan Iqbal's brother for hundreds of millions. The PM's aide asked whether one is to actually believe that Shehbaz Sharif "saved Rs1,000 billion for himself and his sons".

Gill accused Ahsan Iqbal of awarding several contracts to his brother when he was the Minister of Planning. "All these people will have to answer [for their crimes]," he said.