Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif has said that none of the common people were opposing the construction of Orange Line Metro Train and that the privileged class was the only one which was vocal in its opposition to the project.
Talking to Pakistan Today Editor Arif Nizami on his talkshow DNA on Channel 24, Sharif said that a petition was before the Lahore High Court against the Orange Line project and that the government would respond to it. He said that they were ready to use whatever legal recourse was available to them.
Sharif said that Orange Line was not the first project which had faced opposition at the start. He said that opposition politicians had described the Metro bus project in a derogatory manner as jangla bus. However, all political differences aside, it was a great project, which allowed hundreds of thousands of people every day to travel in a convenient and respectable manner and at very affordable rates, he added.
Sharif said that those who travelled on Pajeros couldn’t understand the need for metro bus.
CULTURE/COMPENSATION:
The chief minister said that the Orange Line project was being built with 100 per cent investment from China, except for the land acquisition which the Punjab government had to do on its own. He said that project was not part of CPEC.
Responding to a question regarding low compensation, the chief minister said that it was unfortunate that people had to be uprooted because of the project but that the Orange Line track had to pass through populated areas and there was no alternative available to the government.
He said that the government was offering the biggest compensation package in the history of Pakistan. He said that the package was worth Rs 20 billion and the government would ensure that they provided compensation to all the land owners.
He said that the project’s route had been decided on merit and that his own constituency was part of it.
Sharif sidestepped the question about danger to cultural heritage that the project poses and reiterated his stance that the government would use all the legal options that were available to it. He said that they had tried their best to keep as much distance from the historical places as possible. He said that they even had allocated funds to renovate the heritage places once the project was complete. He argued that the project in some places may even be better for historical places as it would reduce the traffic’s pressure on the roads close by.
Answering a question regarding transparency in the project, he said that there was a complete tendering process even though it was a government to government project and said that they negotiated with the lowest bidder and reduced the price of the project further by Rs 700 million.
He said that China had handed over civil works of the project to Pakistan, as the government had told them that they could finish the project at a smaller cost.
RANGERS IN PUNJAB:
Regarding the firing incident in Karachi in which three PIA employees who were protesting against the airline’s privatisation were killed, Sharif said that the Rangers and other law enforcement agencies had said that they had not fired the shots.
Sharif said that Rangers’ job was to ensure peace and law and order, not to prosecute corruption. He said that it was the job of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to clamp down on corruption.
The chief minister admitted that there was corruption at the ‘functional level’ throughout the country including in Punjab, but said that this was not the case on the ‘government level’. He challenged to show a corruption scandal in which he had been blamed. He said that there had been no corruption allegations against him since 2008.
He cited Transparency International’s improving of Pakistan’s rating regarding corruption perception and said that Pakistan was the only country in the region which had seen an improvement in the corruption rating.
Sharif said that Rana Mashood had appeared before NAB and said that as a chief minister he had never tried to stop them from pursuing the case.
He said that NAB had looked into a number of projects in Punjab and that he had always encouraged them, but he was not going to punish anyone without being presented the evidence.
He said that his government had started projects all over Punjab not just Lahore. He said that a number of projects had been started in rural areas and in Southern Punjab.
He said that while it would take time to rid the country of the scourge of terrorism, it was encouraging that for the first time both the military and the political leadership was fighting terrorists with the same resolve.
And those who ride bullet proof vehicles bought with my money should be ashamed.
Comments are closed.