Changing PM won’t matter unless looted money is brought back: Nawaz

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) President Nawaz Sharif has said that no change in the Prime Minister’s Office will be beneficial for the country unless national wealth laundered in Swiss accounts was brought back.
“For how long will the prime ministers be made scapegoats? Why the Rs 6 billion deposited abroad are not being brought back? Why do they keep on sacrificing the prime minister?” Nawaz asked while speaking to the media at Punjab House in Islamabad. He said the looted money was the root of the whole matter, adding that the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) had announced that even the new prime minister would not comply with the court’s orders of writing a letter to Swiss authorities to reopen corruption cases against President Asif Ali Zardari.
Nawaz said the PPP leaders were not opposing the judiciary’s decision on moral grounds. “They are not taking any moral high grounds,” he said, adding that the PPP actually had a very “dirty cause” and that the public had strong resentment towards it. He said the government was disrupting the entire democratic process by trying to cover up the money that was amassed by Zardari through “commissions and kickbacks”. “Should a man like this be placed at such a post?” Nawaz asked. The PML-N leader questioned why the parliament, even after being given a chance by the Supreme Court, did not take the right decision. “They said the Supreme Court’s decision was wrong. I say the Supreme Court has set precedence in Pakistan by taking such a decision,” Nawaz said, adding that in the past, martial law and other extra-constitutional steps had been taken to deal with such situations.
Nawaz said the current rulers had brought uncountable crises on Pakistan and the sincerity, skill and intent needed to bring Pakistan out of these crises was not apparent in the government’s priorities. “As a result, the country is sinking deeper and deeper into crises,” he added. The PML-N chief outlined the challenges faced by the country, saying that the issues had to be dealt with as soon as possible. The challenges, according to him, were restoring the country’s economy, which was marred by unbearable inflation and unemployment, dealing with electricity load shedding, upholding the sovereignty of the law and resolving the deteriorating law and order situation in Balochistan and Karachi. He also put forth the idea of a foreign policy based on national interest, which would safeguard the interests of Pakistan and “will bring us out of international loneliness”. Nawaz also confirmed the reports on his party’s candidate for the post of prime minister, saying he had decided to field Sardar Mehtaab Abbasi.