Islamabad: In a major embarrassment, cash-strapped Pakistan has put Prime Minister Imran Khan’s official residence in Islamabad’s Red Zone up for rent. A decision in this regard was taken by the Pakistani Federal Cabinet. With the move, the country is hoping to garner revenue from the PM House building. Pakistan’s Federal Cabinet is planning to rent out the Prime Minister’s official residence for cultural, fashion, educational, and other events.
Earlier, the ruling Tehreek-Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf had decided to convert the Prime Minster’s House into a university but the plan has now been dropped in favour of renting out the property.
Prior to this, the ruling government had declared that governors would not stay in Governor Houses anymore to cut costs. The money saved would go into implementing welfare schemes, it had announced.
Imran Khan after taking over as the country’s PM had announced that the Pakistan government doesn’t have money to spend on the public welfare schemes, while some in the country are “living like our colonial masters used to live”.
He has since then been living at his Bani Gala residence and only uses the PM office. Pakistan’s economy has shrunk by USD 19 billion in the last three years since Khan came to the power. When he became the PM he took many austerity steps to cut down the government expenses to give respite to the country’s economy.
Earlier, former finance minister Miftah Ismail remarked that the Imran Khan-led regime was “toying with the economy”, adding that it had increased the loans of the government and state institutions by Rs 45,000 billion.