Khattak flays PDM for public meetings amidst rising coronavirus cases

NOWSHERA: Federal Minister for Defence Pervez Khattak on Sunday advised the opposition parties to adopt constitutional ways to remove the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government instead of going for public meetings during the ongoing second wave of coronavirus.

“The opposition parties are making people vulnerable to Covid-19 by continuing with public meetings, which is a highly dangerous move,” he said while speaking at a function arranged at Mera Khandar area of the Nowshera district.

Several Awami National Party workers, headed by Nawab Ali Khan Babakhel and Zakir Ali Khan Babakhel announced joining the ruling PTI on the occasion. The defence minister welcomed the new entrants to the party and presented them the PTI caps. National Assembly Standing Committee on Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Dr Imran Khattak and the PTI candidate for PK-63 by-poll Mian Umar Kakakhel were present on the occasion.

Pervez Khattak came down hard on the opposition’s Pakistan Democratic Party (PDM) and accused the 11 parties, which were part of the alliance, of struggling for power and thus endangering the lives of the people by holding public meetings in various parts of the country.

He said the ruling party had limited its public meetings and mass contact campaign due to the rising cases of coronavirus during the second wave of the pandemic. The defence minister said the coronavirus cases spiked in the areas after the PDM arranged public meetings there as part of the anti-government campaign.

He believed that the people of the country had rejected the narrative of the PDM.” The parties in the PDM should stop becoming the facilitators of the anti-state elements,” he added. Pervez Khattak felt that the public meetings being arranged by the PDM in different parts of the country would not affect the PTI government.” The governments cannot be sent packing by these gatherings,” he argued.

He said the PTI government would complete its five years term in office, come what may. “Prime Minister Imran Khan was elected by the 220 million people of the country and he would complete his tenure,” said the federal minister.

The defence minister said the armed forces, intelligence agencies, police were on alert to foil any conspiracy against the country. Pervez Khattak enumerated the development projects undertaken by him in Nowshera as public representative so far and vowed to launch more uplift schemes for the welfare of the people of his home district.

He thanked the people of Nowshera for reposing confidence in him and his other family members by electing them to public offices a number of times. “I will never shatter this confidence,” said Pervez Khattak.