PDM parties only washing their dirty linen in public: Farrukh

ISLAMABAD: Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Farrukh Habib Thursday said the past performance of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) showed nothing but shame, failure and humiliation.

While addressing the opening ceremony of the first-ever tennis ball cricket tournament of Video Journalists Association of Islamabad, he asked the multi-party opposition alliance to review its own performance, instead of criticising the government’s three-year rule.

During the last couple of years, the parties in the alliance did nothing and only resorted to washing their dirty linen in public, he said. He said the PDM was fully disintegrated as currently there were two factions in the alliance pursuing different narratives.

One was insisting on politics of resistance while the other called for politics of reconciliation, he added. Their movement was solely limited to blackmailing (the government) for getting an NRO like concession and closure of National Accountability Bureau (NAB). He said their movement had nothing to do with interests of a common man.

The minister said the opposition parties, during their tenures, did nothing for welfare of people, but only focused on building properties abroad and amassing corrupt money through telegraphic transfers (TTs) and fake bank accounts.

About the proposed Pakistan Media Development Authority (PMDA), he said a media complaint commission would be set up under the initiative for protection of journalists’ rights. He said the commission would serve as an effective forum to curb financial exploitation of media workers. It would not only help resolve salary related issues of media workers, but also ensure their job security in an effective way, he added.

To a query, the minister said it was the first government in the country history’s which had set the tradition of presenting yearly performance reports before public on regular basis. Prior to the PTI government, the country was only ruled by those parties that used to hide their performance from the press and public. He said the main purpose of issuing yearly performance was to inform the public about the achievements made by the government on economic, foreign and social fronts.

Farrukh said the economic indicators were on the upward trajectory as there were record remittances pouring in, while exports were surging at fast pace. The current account deficit, which was left by the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PMLN) at $19 billion, was now at its lowest level and the debt-to-GDP ratio was also declining, he added.

He said Rs260 billion was allocated for the Ehsaas programme to steer the people out of poverty. The health card was another major initiative of the government as around Rs1 million health insurance was being offered to each card-holder. The minister remarked that the initiative like health card was not even launched in the developed countries.

He said Rs100 billion were allocated for the youth under the Prime Minister’s Kamyab Jawan Programme. So far, soft loans amounting to over Rs22 billion had been disbursed among young people under the programme, he added.

He also mentioned Kamyab Pakistan programme under which the state would provide Rs500,000 loans to citizens without any collateral. Under the ‘Apna Ghar, Apna Khawab’, he said the banks had received a large number of applications for low-cost houses worth Rs145 billion, and applications for housing units worth Rs50 billion had been approved. He said this was the first government in the history of Pakistan which had taken steps for each and every strata of society.