ISLAMABAD: Imran Khan, the former prime minister, was detained in a corruption case, according to Marriyum Aurangzeb, the minister of information and broadcasting, on Wednesday.
The minister claimed in a statement that Imran Khan received at least 15 notices in the Al-Qadir Trust case, which the National Accountability Bureau was looking into, and that the NAB was looking for him. Imran Khan wasn’t present in this case, but he was supposed to file a reply in the Al-Qadir Trust case, she said. She claimed that after Imran Khan was taken into custody yesterday, PTI leaders encouraged sabotage and arson among party members. She insisted that the PTI activists’ actions from yesterday were preplanned and not a response to the public outcry.
She said that the PTI leadership today claimed that yesterday’s violent protests were not done by their party workers.
When the PTI workers were damaging public and state property yesterday, she questioned why didn’t its leadership stop them from doing so.
The minister said that no political party reacted like this on the arrest of its leaders in the past.
She said PML-N leaders including Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz, Shehbaz Sharif, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Rana Sanaullah, Saad Rafiq and other leaders were also arrested but the PML-N did not react in this manner.
Shehbaz Sharif was summoned in the Saaf Pani case and arrested in the Ashiana case by the NAB, she recalled.
The PML-N had never given the kind of response to its leaders’ arrests, that the PTI has given yesterday, she said.
Marriyum Aurangzeb said that the country had been witnessing yesterday-like activities by PTI for the past many years.
The minister said that after the arrest of Imran Khan, his medical check-up was done, and other SOPs were completed which negated PTI claims.
She said when the police went to arrest Imran Khan in Zaman Park, Lahore PTI workers attacked police officials with petrol bombs.
The minister said that no patriotic Pakistani citizen could take the law into his hand and damage government buildings as
state properties were attacked yesterday.
She made it clear that strict action will be taken against those who damaged state properties.
