Staff Reporter – Lahore:
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) President and Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif said on Thursday that the impact of rising inflation this year, both on the national economy and the poor, remained destructive.
Shehbaz claimed that “meaningless lip-service” by the PTI government would not do any good when inflation had reached a 13-year high, while the people were being obliterated by skyrocketing inflation and unemployment.
The 11.5 per cent monthly increase in inflation happened due to PTI’s wrong economic policies, he said.
“The current account deficits continue to rise, exceeding $5.1 billion. Is this the austerity Imran advocates? The parliament and the National Economic Council had drawn a red line at $2.3 billion,” he maintained.
The PML-N leader continued that poor Pakistanis could not afford even a can of ghee, and were dying from starvation and inability to pay for medicines.
“Tomatoes, cooking oil, rice, fruits, vegetables, eggs, meat, milk, sugar, medicines, construction materials, everything has become too expensive to afford. Are these the good days PTI had promised the nation?” he questioned.
“The decrease in oil prices,” he said, “was a lollypop for the people as they no longer trust the government that dropped the fuel inflation bomb on them in the dark of the night.”
Shehbaz warned the nation that the government was going to increase the petroleum levy by Rs4 every month under IMF conditions.
The PML-N president called the satisfaction of the PTI government over tax collections amid a sharp rise in imports “self-deception”.
