PML-N settling party matters at state's expense in London, says PTI

LAHORE: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Fawad Chaudhry on Monday slammed Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz’s (PML-N) senior leaders for travelling to London to ‘settle party matters on government’s expense’.

Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar and other senior members of the ruling party are currently in London to meet Nawaz Sharif and attend a party gathering to discuss party affairs.

Questioning the PML-N leaders’ London trip, the PTI leader asked them to explain on whose expenses they travelling abroad.

Turning his guns on the finance minister, he said, the minister traveled to Tajikistan in a special plane, inflicting extra cost of millions of rupees on the finance department.

Chaudhry said the PML-N leaders were busy in their visits to London while the country continued to face problems.

He said Sharif’s London plan has failed to materialize, adding that the ruling family was seeking another National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) to go unpunished on corruption charges.

He announced that his party would submit an adjournment motion in parliament calling for debate on the issue involving the ministers’ foreign tours on state’s expense and provision of official protocol to the former prime minister in London.

He claimed Pakistan’s High Commissioner to the UK welcomed Sharif on his arrival in London but did not give the same protocol to incumbent PM Shahid Khaqan Abbasi.