In a letter written to the prime minister and the four chief ministers, the APAT central general secretary Naeem Mir asked them to shun the practice of wasting billions of rupees on politically motivated publicity campaigns. In a separate letter sent to the Election Commissioner, he urged him to take notice of an instance of pre-poll rigging.
"What are the achievements of the governments during the last five years that they are spending billions of rupees collected from taxpayers on the projection of their leaders?" APAT general secretary questioned in the letter.
He said more than 58 per cent citizens are facing food insecurity while every four Pakistanis out of 10 are living below the poverty line. Every new born baby is indebted with about Rs 80,000. Security institutions have no proper equipments while bomb disposal staff has no safety jackets but the government is misguiding the public through wrong commercials at the expense of the taxpayers and no one is checking them.
He said that almost all national institutions, including the PIA, Pakistan Railways and Pakistan Steel Mills, have been ruined. The government lacks the funds to clear the circular debt it owes to Independent Power Producers (IPPs), while the Federal Board of Revenue is failing to meet the tax collection target and currency worth Rs 4 billion is being daily printed to meet its every day financial obligations," the communiqué says, referring to the failure of the government on various fronts to support its argument against publicity at the public's cost. Federal and provincial governments are getting political mileage for their respective parties, which is a misuse of state money and tantamount to pre-poll rigging.