Nawaz is people’s Sadiq, Ameen despite court order: Maryam

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Maryam Nawaz on Saturday said former prime minister Nawaz Sharif was Sadiq and Ameen for the people despite the court verdict against him.

She said the judges seemed to know the financial and business matters of Imran Khan more than Imran himself.

Addressing a public meeting in NA-120, Maryam said the double standards of justice were blatantly visible. “At one end those with ‘probable’ ownership of offshore company are disqualified while at other end the one who confesses ownership on air is declared ‘Sadiq and Ameen’ by the court,” she added.

Talking about her experience while attending the NAB hearings with her father, she said the statements of those brought in to testify against them were are at sea. “When the court asks questions from them, they neither know why they are testifying against Nawaz nor do they have any information what is written in the documents they are testifying for. ‘We have been brought here and these documents were handed over to us by somebody else,’ they say,” said Maryam.

She said, “The fourth witness, who was supposed to testify against us, when asked about the proof of embezzlement in the accounts of Maryam and Nawaz, said there isn’t a single evidence of any embezzlement.”

She said Imran had been whining for the past four years while losing one election after another, be it the local government or cantonment election or by-elections. This, she said, showed that the people did not buy his obstructionist politics of sit-ins, which dragged the country’s economy back.

She said a disqualified Nawaz sitting at his residence strikes such insecurities in the hearts of his opponents that those who wouldn’t even want to see each other’s had been forced to sit together in order to counter Nawaz’s public power.

The rivals of Nawaz were mere tissue papers, Maryam remarked, adding that it was his fear which led them to form political alliances.

She said Pakistan’s politics of the country revolves around the PML-N president and his opponents had become restless as they do not have any substantial issue to address in their rallies and meetings.

She claimed that Nawaz had fulfilled all promises including those related to CPEC, power outages and economic growth.

While leaving the party workers' gathering, Maryam denied the reports that any National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) was being sought and said the political opponents of PML-N needed to be asked about who was providing the NRO. She also said that the Qadri-led APC would fail as it had failed earlier.

Nawaz and Shahbaz Sharif were in Saudi Arabia for Umrah and they would also conduct meetings during their stay in the kingdom, she added.

"It is very clear that foreign powers interact with political parties which have won elections and cultivate relations with them, not with those who have lost," Maryam remarked.