With the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government finally making the “difficult decision” of approaching the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a bailout to address the mounting balance of payments crisis faced by the country, the ruling party has drawn the ire of thousands of social media users.
Amid the criticism that PTI is facing over its “double standards” – censuring previous governments’ practice of seeking loans and resorting to the same – the official Twitter account of the party’s Lahore wing has deleted a tweet that criticised the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government for approaching the IMF.
“Our prime minister begs to IMF like beggars,” the tweet, published by PTI Lahore Official (@PTIOfficialLHR) back in October 2015, read.
Ever since the government announced approaching the monetary fund, netizens had been retweeting the said post until the tweet “disappeared”.
The Twitterati, however, are continuing to remind the government of its earlier statements by flooding the microblogging website with screenshots of the said post. “Is that another U-Turn,” they are questioning.
Oh, here’s the @PTIofficial tweet they’ve now deleted. This could apply to their own party’s government/the new prime minister but nope. Mein karon tou sala character dheela hai… #Pakistan pic.twitter.com/RINEaIfZTI
— Mehreen Zahra-Malik (@mehreenzahra) October 9, 2018
How will u justify this U turn of PTI govt, as they were consistently specifying their stance of not going to IMF nd now here they r like all passed away govts. This govt is also standing before IMF ready to accept all of their conditions blindley. HELL!!!!!
— sheraz waris (@sherazwaris159) October 8, 2018
Now the #Tweet has been deleted by @PTIofficial Jab ap kisi ki taraf 1 ungli uthaty hain toh yeh mat boliye k baki ki 4 ungliyan apki apni taraf hoti hain. Really disappointed pic.twitter.com/gQ9R67Ko3i
— Kashif Mir (@kashifmirathar) October 9, 2018
@PTIofficial deleted their tweet, it was about how the #Pakistan prime minister (#NawazSharif, at the time) was a beggar of the #IMF. Now their own government is headed for a bailout.@ImranKhanPTI pic.twitter.com/zj6V08Gwfn
— Sabah Alam (@AlamSabah) October 9, 2018
Meanwhile, a few are using the same tweet to term Prime Minister Imran Khan what his party had once called former premier Nawaz Sharif.
Yes Indeed … ??@PTIOfficialLHR #SavePakEconomy pic.twitter.com/CCoFMHb28w
— THE SWAGGY CHILL BRAT ?? (@Shehrozzzzzzz) October 9, 2018