Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan has said that no nation could move forward without long-term planning and it was tragic that governments in Pakistan could not do so due to the general election being held every five years.

According to The News, the premier, while addressing a function in connection with documentary-drama ‘Paani Ke Pankh‘ on Thursday, termed the 10 years of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) governments from 2008 through 2018 the “decade of darkness, marred by massive corruption, political expediency and inefficiency”.

“When criminals become country heads, then no country can develop. So, one has to have faith in oneself. There are talented Pakistanis in every field outside Pakistan. The country’s system has to be fixed,” he said.

“It takes a little time; people should not worry that the change has not come yet. It takes time to change the mindset. It’s tragic that in our country elections are held every five years due to which we do not have a long-term plan,” he continued.

He said dams were built with a long-term plan and cited China as a country that is becoming the world’s fastest growing economic power and superpower because of long-term planning.

“When we visited China, they told us what they were going to do in the next 10 to 20 years. No nation can move forward unless it has a long-term plan and thinks ahead. Unfortunately, we have a period of five years. We try to accomplish everything in five years, spend billions of rupees on advertisements and then fight elections on it,” he pointed out.

Imran believed that this handicap had done a lot of damage to Pakistan.