AsiaNet-Pakistan Premier Editorial Content and Press Release Distribution Service
Karachi, May 07, 2020 (PPI-OT): Sindh Minister for Information Syed Nasir Hussain Shah said Thursday that according to the medical experts, the month of May is very dangerous for Pakistan with regard to the spread of coronavirus, therefore, according to these experts, lockdown should be further tightened in the month of May.
The provincial minister said that the head of the World Health Organization had also warned all the countries that if they did not opt for more effective lockdown in their respective countries, the coronavirus would spread so fast that it would be impossible to control it.
“Therefore, we should make decisions based on facts rather than emotions,” he said. Shah said that the Sindh government also cared about the sentiments and businesses of the people, but the facts did not allow them to let all the businesses open at once. He said that the first thing that was important was to save the lives of the people.
“If we don’t focus on saving people’s lives and taking care of their health, then our health system will collapse, as unfortunately, it is not strong enough to tackle a pandemic like a coronavirus,” he added. Shah while citing the example of Balochistan, said that this was the reason that forced the Balochistan government to extend the lockdown in the province until May 19. Praising the Balochistan government, the minister also said that if such a decision had been taken by the Sindh government, the federal spokespersons would have been lashing out at the Sindh government constantly.
He said that because this decision was taken by the government in Balochistan, no one criticized it, while the Sindh government had been constantly portrayed as an enemy of the people. Shah while lamenting this double standard said that the Sindh government had always been criticized without any reason.
He that if the Sindh government was stressing for a severe lockdown in the month of May, it was because of saving lives and taking care of the health of the people, adding that, there was personal gain involved in it. He clarified that the decision of lockdown till May 9 was taken by the federal government and which was announced by the federal minister and not by any minister of the Sindh government.
Shah said that it was very surprising that today the Federal Minister had changed his opinion by saying that all this was going wrong and people should be given leniency in the lockdown. The provincial information minister said that people should also think about the double standards of the federal government before criticizing the Sindh government.
He said that only the Sindh government was being portrayed as the enemy of the poor, while a uniform policy was being implemented in the whole country. Syed Nasir Hussain Shah said that the Sindh government implemented the same decisions that were taken during the meetings held between the federal government and the provincial governments.
“Despite all this, the sudden onset of criticism of the Sindh government is beyond our comprehension,” he said. Shah said that every one of us needed to understand, that all of us had to stay away from political rhetoric and political point-scoring, at a time when a pandemic like Coronavirus was rapidly gaining ground in the country, due to which people were not only getting sick but were dying too. The provincial information minister said that the Sindh government was repeatedly saying that if this pandemic spread beyond control, then our health system was not capable of handling so many patients or we did not had enough ventilators to save people’s lives.
He said that the Sindh government wanted that all the necessary decisions should be taken at the level of the federal government because we feared that if this did not happen then the wrong decision would be taken by adopting the anti-Sindh government policy, which could be harmful to the people.
Shah said that the Hon’ble Chief Justice of the Supreme Court had also said that a uniform policy should be adopted in the whole country which should in the interest of the people. The provincial Information Minister said that the Sindh government only wanted to maintain strict lockdown in the month of May as per the opinion of medical experts.
For more information, contact:
Sindh Information and Archives Department
Government of Sindh
95-Sindh Secretariat 4-B, Karachi, Pakistan
Tel: +92-21-99204423, +92-21-99204401
Email: pressinformationzubair@gmail.com
Website: http://sindhinformation.gos.pk