While committing to respect the mandate of other parties, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif counseled politicians to abjure the habit of mudslinging and join hands with each other to put an end to extremism and ensure the country made progress. He made the remark before the media after paying homage to the Quaid at his mausoleum in Karachi on Thursday. As he was flanked on one side by Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah and on the other by Governor Ishratul Ibad, he felt pride in proclaiming that he was following that policy. Moral probity, which should prevent people from casting aspersions on others just to gain individual or party ends, is a scarce commodity here in the country and that puts paid to all sincere efforts to march ahead. One hopes political parties would accept the challenge and expects the PML-N also to act upon its own advice.
Mian Nawaz, who also visited Gadani, talked of not only ridding the country of the debilitating power shortage, but also achieving as ambitious a target as 50,000MW capacity in 25 years. That would, he asserted, make Pakistan surplus in power. The payment of Rs 480 circular debt had already reduced the gap between supply and demand by 1700MW. He inaugurated an energy corridor of 5200MW at Gadani.
His interaction with the journalists mainly focused on his government’s economic resurgence plan, though he briefly touched on the law and order and the more complicated issue of terrorism as well. The Kashgar-Gwadar Economic Corridor would have industrial zones all along the way, providing job and business opportunities to the people and entrepreneurs of Pakistan. Similarly, the six-lane Karachi-Lahore Motorway would greatly help in the economical transportation of goods. Both these projects, Chinese firms offered to come forward to execute them during his recent visit to China and some understanding was reached with them for taking up the job.
At Karachi, he maintained that the federal government was watching the law and order situation in the city and would come up with some concrete ideas in the near future to set things right. The government planned to establish a counter-terrorism cell to form part of the overall counter-terrorism strategy that was in the making.
It is yet too early to pronounce judgments on whether the ruling PML-N’s tall claims would bring results. The nation should keep its fingers crossed, hoping all the while that it has learnt from the debacle the PPP and its allies suffered at the polls and avoid their mistakes.