LAHORE: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Political Communication Shahbaz Gill has termed a fake vaccine entry in the name of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif a “conspiracy”.
The special assistant, addressing a press conference on Saturday, claimed the alleged conspiracy was hatched to defame the country’s coronavirus database.
Gill claimed PML-N Vice-President Maryam Nawaz and a group of members of the Punjab Assembly had come up with the plan, and the MPAs made Naveed responsible for the act.
“Naveed is a resident of Shad Bagh — an area in Lahore — and his entire family is a supporter of PML-N,” the special assistant said.
Gill further stated that Lahore’s Kot Khawaja Saeed Hospital, where the false entry was made, falls in the constituency of PML-N’s Imran Nazir and Chaudhry Shahbaz.
Chaudhry Shahbaz had used his influence to get Adil Rafiq — a person suspected of involvement in the case — hired. “MPA Chaudhry Shahbaz will have to answer for this,” Gill said.
The special assistant said that the MPA’s social media account is filled with pictures of him posting with PML-N’s MPAs. “The cancer of corruption’s cancer has spread to every institution,” he added.
Circling back to Naveed, Gill said that he had fled to Germany and the government would work to get him back.
PML-N had a plan in place under which they got their own people appointed in institutions, the special assistant alleged, adding: “Indian media highlighted the issue to malign Pakistan.”
A fake coronavirus vaccine entry was made in the National Immunisation Management System (NIMS) using Nawaz’s name at the Government Kot Khawaja Saeed Hospital in Lahore on Wednesday, September 22.
As per the fake entry, Nawaz, who is currently in London, got his first shot of the COVID-19 vaccine Sinovac at 4:03pm on Wednesday at the hospital.
The Punjab government has suspended the Medical Superintendent (MS) and a senior doctor of the Lahore hospital in relation to the fake vaccine entry.
The suspended officers were directed to report to the health department immediately.
Moreover, cases were registered against three other hospital employees, two of which were arrested.
The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and the police have registered separate cases in this regard.
According to the FIA cybercrime wing, watchman Abul Hassan and ward boy Adil used the ID of a third employee, Naveed, to enter former prime minister Nawaz’s fake entry into the system.
Police have registered cases against the three suspects and arrested Abul Hassan and Adil.
In addition, the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) has summoned the Punjab health secretary to Islamabad in response to the development.
The provincial health authorities also prepared a report concerning the controversy and shared it with Chief Minister Punjab Usman Buzdar, highlighting lapses in the hospital’s monitoring and supervision systems.
“Four employees of the hospital admitted to making a fake entry of Nawaz Sharif’s data,” stated the report, adding that no senior staff was deployed at the health facility and that the management had authorised lower-level staff to update the record.
Punjab’s Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department took notice of the incident and wrote a letter to the FIA and asked it to investigate the matter and take necessary action against the culprits.