The PTI government is apparently not relenting in its desire to crush the opposition in the name of accountability, by going to the extent of filing an accountability case against Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, Mr Shah has been a challenge for the federal government ever since he handled the covid-19 pandemic in his province more sensibly than the central government. The PTI continue to pursue the PPP through NAB, as the reference against Mr Shah is accompanied by ones against Senate Deputy Chairman Saleem Mandviwala and ex-President Asif Zardari. The PML(N) continues to get attention, as shown by a petition by Nation Assembly Opposition Leader Shehbaz Sharif’s wife, and Punjab Assembly Opposition Leader Hamza Shehbaz’s mother, Mrs Nusrat Shehbaz, as had been moved before the Lahore High Court, filed by her attorney, even though she remains abroad, it seeks exemption from personal appearance before NAB, where she is under investigation for the cases in which her husband and son are in jail.
Clearly, the government is responding to the economic problems the country is facing by renewing its flagging efforts to after the opposition. The timing is unfortunate, for the opposition in in the middle to a campaign to oust it. There have not been many positive reports recently, and the report that imports of food items have increased, may indicate why the prices of wheat and flour have not stabilised. These were exported, creating a needless shortage, and now find the Government sees the country facing a price crisis which threatens people’s food security.
The government should realize that such tactics as pursuing anyone through the National Accountability Bureau no longer distract anyone from the hard realities of daily life. The government must realise that its own image has been tarnished by the Broadsheet scandal revelations as well as the PTI’s own foreign funding case, and the only thing that will help it will be the efforts it makes in plain everyday things, like reforming the tax machinery, and all the other elements of sensible economic management, that it has been shying away from so far.
