June 29, 2020
By Asra Haque
LAHORE
On June 29, Pakistan Peoples Party Chair Bilawal Bhutto lambasted Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Freudian slip in which he referred to Osama bin Laden as a “martyr”. In a fiery speech, Bhutto drew attention to what he referred to as a show of hypocrisy where the Prime Minister referred to an international terrorist who was behind the murder of scores of Pakistani civilians and soldiers, as well as the murder of and Muslims the world over.
Bhutto also pointed out that Prime Minister Imran Khan was a coward for refusing to denote the same courtesy to his mother, former PPP chair and Pakistan’s first female Prime Minister of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto, who had been killed in a suicide bombing attack by the al-Qaeda.
Bilawal Bhutto’s speech drew opposition from the ruling party, prompting Speaker of the National Assembly, Asad Qaiser to request calm. He also informed Bhutto to refrain from using derogatory remarks (especially his use of the term “coward”) against a respected member of the assembly, at which the baffled PPP chair demanded to know why he should be checked on what he says when the Prime Minister himself called a known terrorist a martyr.
