Dawn.comUpdated April 22, 2018
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Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif addresses a joint press conference in Karachi alongside MQM-P Convener Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui. ─ DawnNews
Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, during a second visit to Karachi in as many weeks, met with senior leaders of the MQM-P's Bahadurabad faction on Sunday and vowed to make the metropolis "the New York of South Asia" if his party was elected to power in the upcoming polls.
Addressing a joint press conference with MQM-P Convener Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui after a meeting with the party's leadership ─ including Karachi Mayor Waseem Akhtar, Nasreen Jalil and Faisal Subzwari ─ Shahbaz claimed he had not come to Karachi with a political agenda. "I came here as a Pakistani," he said.
"What happened with this city in the past is a tale of cruelty, but there is no use crying about it now. Yes, there must be accountability for it," he said, asking where development funds released for Karachi over the years had disappeared.
He claimed that when Nawaz Sharif was given the mandate, he decided that if peace did not return to Karachi, there would be no peace in Pakistan. "He tasked the Rangers to bring peace to Karachi and gave them freedom of action. They did a good job and today peace has returned."