ISLAMABAD - Prime Minister Imran Khan on Thursday vowed to expose the real characters behind the lawyers’ agitation, saying no one will be allowed to take the law into his or her hands.
The prime minister maintained that the miscreants wanted to create Model Town like carnage, but the incumbent government foiled their heinous designs.
Imran Khan said this during a telephonic conversation with Punjab Information Minister Fayyazul Hassan Chohan yesterday. He later discussed the issued in the meeting of PTI’s Core Committee in Islamabad.
The prime minister appreciated Fayyazul Chohan’s courage for expressing restraint over lawyers’ vicious attack on Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC). Imran Khan, while describing Chohan as an asset of the party, lauded his nerve for offering restraint.
Chohan was slapped and tortured by outrageous lawyers outside Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) hospital in Lahore on Wednesday.
Talking to the media after PTI Core Committee meeting, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on Information and Broadcasting Dr Firdous Ashiq Awan said Prime Minister Imran Khan and PTI Core Committee had strongly condemned the lawyers attack and rampage at PIC.
The Core Committee declared that zero tolerance against such mongers of violence at public departments, providing facilities to the general public, should be observed.
The Core Committee held that the clash of two sacred professions in Lahore, the lawyers and the doctors, is not at all encouraging and would add to the problems of the country’s present governance system.
“Two developments came before us the other day, the lawyers attacked the hospital while wearing black coats and on the other side, the doctors escaped their duty to save their lives leaving patients in lurch,” she said adding they have to see both the moves. “One profession — the lawyers’ fraternity — is the defender of the law and the constitution and the other — the doctors — have the duty to serve human beings and the clash of both these professions is not encouraging in the present system of Pakistan.”
She said Prime Minister has given the responsibility to Chief Minister Punjab Usman Buzdar to form a strategy after talking to all stakeholders to avoid such incidents in public delivery offices in future.
The Punjab government would bring to book all those who were involved in this matter, she said.
The Core Committee decided that the party’s legal wing leadership should start consultation with the lawyers’ bodies and associations, and bar councils, besides taking the apex judiciary on board for devising a robust policy to discourage such law-abettors among the ranks of lawyers’ community, Firdous said.
She stressed the lawyers fraternity should pinpoint such black sheep and expel them from bar councils. The entire lawyers community should not be blamed for heinous criminal act as miscreants were merely a handful who would be identified from the video footages and punished in accordance with law.
She said the prime minister was briefed on the PIC attack issue by Punjab Chief Minister, Inspector General of Punjab Police and Chief Secretary whereas the final report was yet to be presented.
INFLATION BURDEN ON MASSES
Firdous said the Core Committee focused on four key agenda items, including inflation that had put serious burden on the masses and initiated a crisis in the country. She said inflation was extensively discussed by the Core Committee. The party leaders presented various proposals to control price hike in the markets.
“The recommendations of the committee would be sent to Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan where we have our coalition governments for implementation and relieve the masses of increasing prices of goods at the grassroots level,” she added.
Firdous said the prime minister was briefed on positive economic indicators, relief measures taken to facilitate the general public and the overall political situation prevailing in the country.
HOPE FOR CONSENSUS ON ECP ISSUES
She said the prime minister emphasised the need to strengthen the parliamentary committee constituted for the appointment of Chief Election Commissioner and members of the Election Commission of Pakistan.
Expressing the hope that consensus would be developed between the opposition and the government, the Core Committee members observed that in case of disagreement, the latter should set its own priorities over the matter.
Firdous said the social media cell in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting was going to be upgraded as a digitalised wing. The SAPM said “It is a strange that all the political leaders seeking bail from the higher courts on medical grounds are going to their homes instead of hospitals where the ‘critical patients’ like them can be cured.”
She said a well-coordinated system was being devised to ensure smooth dispensation of facilities to the people at different public institutions and to trickle the impact of reforms undertaken by the PTI government down to the masses while removing all the hindrances in that regard.
Firdous said the Core Committee had a serious debate on the governance issues, particularly in the administrative and financial departments, including revenue and police, which had direct interaction with the masses.
She said there was consensus that no leniency should be observed in the accountability process as Prime Minister Imran Khan also wanted to ensure an across-the-board accountability of the corrupt.
To a question, she said the district management and price magistrates’ empowerment to control artificial price hike in the markets was under discussion in Punjab whereas a special and technology-based system would be introduced in that regard.
The Core Committee endorsed the decision to establish farmer markets and minimise the role of middle man and the strategy of the federal government in collaboration with the provincial governments to provide relief to the masses. It decided to expand the network of the markets to bring these to the level of union council and town committees level.
The meeting showed satisfaction on the policies of the government to promote industrialization, job creation and to control inflation.
PM instructed all party leaders that they should aware the public through public gatherings about their effective role in the local government system. He added reorganisation of the party should be completed at the district, tehsil and union council level before next local government elections scheduled to be held next year.