“I hereby declare that I am guilty of having siphoned off money from the National Treasury, and have laundered it abroad to set up offshore companies, under cover of which to buy properties and establish businesses in Britain and elsewhere.”
This is a statement that Mian Nawaz Sharif the Prime Minister of Pakistan is certainly never going to make, even if Imran Khan succeeds in bringing out millions of protestors in the streets and on the roads.
The easiest wayout for the Prime Minister would have been to become himself a plaintiff against the outrageous inclusion of his and his family’s names in the list of the culprits of the Panama Papers.
That is, if he had done nothing objectionable in the whole affair, and his sons and daughter had built that fortune by their own hard toil and special skills.
It is clear from the way the Prime Minister has left no stone unturned to block any acceptable investigation into the whole scandal, that he is virtually fighting for his political life.
How far will he go to frustrate the efforts and the campaign of his adversaries—specially Imran Khan— to make him face the consequences of an act of fiscal villainy committed against the nation and the country.
Corruption and Plunder are the usual forms of expression used in such cases— but I am using the phrase ‘fiscal villainy’ out of respect for the high office Mian Nawaz Sharif holds.
Does Imran Khan expect with any degree of realistic comprehension of the Prime Minister’s position (and state of mind) that he, in the end, may choose to step down in favour of someone the National Assembly elects to succeed or replace him? I don’t think Imran Khan is so innocuous as to entertain such a wishful thought.
Then what does Imran Khan hope to achieve through his massive ‘protest offensive?’
Mian Nawaz Sharif is not General Charles de Gaulle that he will get so impressed with and frustrated by the massive unrest that he will call it a day and declare: “As the people of Pakistan are fed up with me, and want someone else to lead them, I have chosen to prefer retirement over disgrace.”
Mian Nawaz Sharif has an industrial empire and a monumental fortune to defend and secure.
He has only one way to go. Stand upto the challenge, whichever corner it comes from.
Walled fortresses are not conquered by protesters…
They are brought down through brutal force.
Not meaning thereby that IK’s charge will not have consequences…..