MPA asks Imran to choose between ideology and Pervaiz Khattak

Ziaullah says he has proofs about CM’s involvement in corruption

PESHAWAR: Breaking his silence months after his release from the lockup, disgruntled Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Member Provincial Assembly (MPA) Ziaullah Afridi on Saturday asked party chief Imran Khan to choose between his party and Chief Minister Pervez Khattak whom he accused of using the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Ehtesab Commission (KPEC) for his ulterior motives.

Talking to The News after his press conference, former provincial minister for Mines and Mineral Development Ziaullah Afridi said he had proofs about the involvement of the chief minister in corruption.

He said that former director general of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Ehtesab Commission (KPEC) Lt Gen (Retd) Hamid Khan had found out that the chief minister was involved in cases of corruption, but no action was taken against him.

He claimed that he had evidence about the clandestine meetings of the KPEC investigators with the chief minister.

He alleged that the chief minister had appointed a murderer as investigator against whom five first information reports (FIRs) were registered, while its chief investigator, who belonged to the constituency of the chief minister, was the crony of the chief executive of the province.

The PTI leader, who is quite popular among the local chapter of the party, said that party workers were anxious to stage a sit-in in front of the KPEC offices if the party chief continued to ignore the lopsided working of the commission.

“I very humbly request Khan Sahib to please either save his party, which is bastion of principles and ideology of millions of the dedicated workers or save the elements around him including chief minster against whom corruption charges have been levelled by the former director general of KPEC,” he added.

“It is so painful for me like many other party workers that Imran Khan is being misled while PTI and its workers whose hearts still throb with “Khan” are going to take the brunt of all this,” Ziaullah said.

Earlier, speaking at the crowed press conference at the Peshawar Press Club, Ziaullah Afridi said PTI workers and his supporters would lay siege to the offices of KPEC, if Imran Khan didn’t take note of the ‘misuse’ of powers by Chief Minister Pervez Khattak.

He told the press conference that KPEC had lost integrity and it had no stature in the eyes of the pubic as it had failed to take action against the corrupt.

“It is not the Ehtesab Commission of the people of the province. Rather Chief Minister Pervez Khattak is using it to victimise me,” he said.

The “so-called Ehtesab Commission”, he said, raised hue and cry against many other ministers and officials for their alleged involvement in corruption, but took no action against them.

The former PTI minister went on to add that Imran Khan and Pervez Khattak from their containers at the sit-ins blamed Awami National Party and Pakistan People’s Party ministers for corruption in the province, but none of them was ever arrested which is beyond the belief of the common people of the province.

He also showed evidence to media as to how all “fictitious cases were built up against him (Ziaullah) while the real culprits involved in loot and plunder of the mines and minerals were roaming around.”

He said Imran Khan was misled by influential people in the party and it was now up to the party chief to decide to save his ideology or the corrupt elements. “We attended the last protest against Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in the Panama Papers leaks case and we will do the same in future as well as we are true workers of the party. We will also besiege the offices of the KPEC in Hayatabad, if the PTI chief didn’t take note of his complaints against the commission.

To a question, he said that the action taken against a Chinese firm in the mining case was based on facts and as provincial minister of the sector he always followed rules while taking action even against very close relatives of the chief minister that led to his differences with Pervez Khattak.