New Delhi: Pakistan’s former prime minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday said that the financial difficulties faced by the country are not the fault of India or the US, but "we shot ourselves in our own foot", indirectly referring to the powerful military establishment for its woes.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo, who is eying to become prime minister for a record fourth time, said that he was ousted from power three times in 1993, 1999, and 2017, reported PTI.
During a conversation with the party's ticket aspirants, Sharif said, "Today where Pakistan has reached (in terms of the state of the economy) this is not done by India, the US or even Afghanistan. In fact, we shot ourselves in our own foot...they (a reference to the military) imposed a selected (government) on this nation by rigging the 2018 polls that led to the sufferings of the people and downfall of the economy."
Slamming the judges for legitimising military dictators, the 73-year-old leader said, “The judges garland them (military dictators) and legitimise their rule when they break the Constitution. When it comes to a prime minister the judges stamp his ouster. The judges also approve the act of dissolution of the parliament...why?,” PTI reported.
The PML-N leader, who returned to the country from London in October ending a four-year-long self-imposed exile, is the only Pakistani politician who became the prime minister of the coup-prone country for a record three times.
On Monday, Nawaz said that in 1999, "I was prime minister in the morning and in the evening I was declared a hijacker. Similarly in 2017, I was ousted from power for not taking salary from my son." "They (military establishment) made this decision as they wanted to bring their selected man into power,” he said, referring to his arch-rival Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) supremo Imran Khan.
Earlier on Thursday, Sharif, in a televised address to the nation, blamed the military establishment of 2014-17 for forcing senior judges to remove him from power, as per PTI.
"They (a reference to the military establishment) visited the residences of senior judges and threatened them. They achieved the required court verdicts against me through coercion," he said.