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Pakistan’s new Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Thursday the country’s economy had stagnated under his predecessor Imran Khan, setting the tone for possibly months of bitterness before an election that must be held by October next year.

Sharif, sworn in Monday after Khan was ousted by a no-confidence vote in parliament, is still finalising his cabinet but has called for “Pakistan speed” to hurry along development projects and fix the economy.

On Thursday the 70-year-old notorious workaholic visited a metro bus project in Rawalpindi and complained about the pace of infrastructure development.

“Almost all sectors of economy remained stagnant under IK,” he later tweeted, referring to his predecessor by his initials.

His early-morning visit came after Khan on Wednesday night held a huge rally in Peshawar.

Khan — along with most of his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) lawmakers — quit the national assembly after losing Sunday’s no-confidence vote, saying he would take his fight to the people to press for an early election.

On Wednesday, Khan said he would stage twice-weekly rallies across the country until a new poll date was set.

“Young people, get ready, I will take to the streets with you. I will go out in every city, and I will continue to go out until they are forced to hold election.”

– ‘Pakistan speed’ –

Sharif, younger brother of three-time prime minister Nawaz Sharif, set out his stall on Tuesday by ordering the government to adopt a six-day work-week, instead of the previous five, and bringing forward office opening hours to 8 am from 10 am.

His “Pakistan speed” policy is an extension of a similar programme he introduced as chief minister of Punjab, the country’s most populous province, where he was credited with launching a series of high-profile — and vote-catching — projects.

The government would take unspecified “emergency measures” to stabilise the economy, Sharif’s office said later, focusing on steps to improve the condition of ordinary people.

Sharif inherits crippling national debt, galloping inflation and a feeble rupee — although analysts say Khan also took over a broken economy in 2018 that was further battered by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Khan’s ouster heralds the return of two dynastic parties that have dominated Pakistan politics for decades.

Sharif’s centrist Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) joined forces with the centre-left Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) — fiefdom of the Bhutto family — to press the no-confidence vote.

Khan tried everything to stay in power after losing his majority in parliament through defections by his own lawmakers and a coalition partner — including dissolving the assembly and calling a fresh election.

But the Supreme Court deemed all his actions illegal and ordered them to reconvene and vote.

The cricketer-turned-politician insists he has been the victim of a “regime change” conspiracy involving Washington and his opponents, and vowed to take his fight to the streets in the hope of forcing an early election.

On Wednesday night Khan told thousands of supporters that the new government was “imported”, saying Pakistan needed to forge an independent global path.

He has said Washington wanted him removed because he refused to take sides in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and also because of his close links to China.

Washington, Moscow and Beijing have all congratulated Sharif since he took over.

Prosecutors investigating the 2020 death of Argentine soccer legend Diego Maradona have asked that the medical staff who treated him be tried for negligent homicide.

In their request Wednesday, the prosecutors said “omissions” and mismanagement by eight medical professionals in charge of Maradona placed him in a “situation of helplessness” and abandoned him “to his fate” during his home hospitalization, according to the court filing cited by the official Telam news agency. 

Maradona died at age 50 in 2020 while recovering from brain surgery for a blood clot, and after decades of battles with cocaine and alcohol addictions.

Neurosurgeon and family doctor Leopoldo Luque and psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov are under investigation over his death as the main people responsible for the health of the former football star.

Six others, including psychologist Carlos Diaz and medical coordinator Nancy Forlini, are also accused.

The prosecution accuses them of “simple homicide with dolus eventualis,” an offense in which a person is negligent while knowing their negligence can cause someone’s death.

They could face sentences ranging from eight to 25 years in prison.

According to the prosecutors, the defendants “were the protagonists of an unprecedented, totally deficient and reckless hospitalization at home”, and allegedly committed a “series of improvisations, mismanagement and shortcomings”.

The defense must now present its arguments and may ask for the case to be dismissed.

Maradona is widely considered one of the greatest footballers in history and led Argentina to victory in the 1986 World Cup.

Generations of Sri Lankan leaders have sought guidance from seers and astrologers, and now one has dared tell the ruling Rajapaksa family that their time in office is up.

As politicians find their homes besieged by large and resentful crowds, incensed over months of fuel shortages and lengthy blackouts, spiritual advisers have also found themselves under pressure. 

Images of soothsayers standing alongside top administration figures have been shared on social media by activists calling on them to urge President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to stand down. One of the most prominent among them has already broken ranks with the government. 

The long-time personal astrologer of Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa — the president’s older brother — this week said the economic crisis signalled the downfall of a clan that has dominated Sri Lanka’s affairs for much of the past two decades.

“This is the end of the entire Rajapaksa family,” Sumanadasa Abeygunawardena told AFP.

The fortune-teller’s reputation took a hit in 2015 after he suggested Mahinda call an early election that the leader lost — but his latest prediction is more emphatic.

“Even a grade two child knows today that the Rajapaksas are doomed,” he said. 

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa — Mahinda’s younger brother — and Sri Lanka’s army chief are also known to have had a long association with a fortune-teller in the historic Buddhist centre of Anuradhapura.

Local media have reported the president makes regular pilgrimages to meet with Gnana Akka, and claimed she had a considerable role in shaping the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

A group of activists clashed with police this month as they attempted to storm a shrine belonging to the seer, who fled after officers tipped her off to the crowd’s impending arrival.

Gnana Akka’s influence also extended to several other top politicians, said newspaper columnist Kusal Perera, who quipped that the prophet’s powers had apparently not granted her advance warning of the protest.

“How can Gnana Akka protect the president when she is unable to protect herself?” he said.

– Magic ritual –

Astrology is widely practised in Sri Lanka, and people commonly consult seers before building new homes, entering into contracts or scheduling weddings. 

Political addresses to the nation and the inauguration of new parliament sessions are also usually held at auspicious times. 

Former military commanders have even reported that timings of military actions in Sri Lanka’s long civil war were decided by astrologers, who were also consulted to coin codenames for operations. 

The Rajapaksa brothers are only the latest in a long tradition of Sri Lankan leaders balancing otherworldly advice with that of technocrats and civil servants. 

Former president Ranasinghe Premadasa used a magic ritual to ward off his impending impeachment in 1991, according to a tell-all book by Vijaya Palliyaguruge, who at the time was the parliament’s serjeant-at-arms, the officer maintaining order.

A sorcerer was tasked with juicing limes and spreading the liquids on the seats of lawmakers to ensure their support of the leader. 

Premadasa survived the attempt to topple him but his reliance on the occult did not protect him from his assassination two years later in a suicide bomb attack by a member of the Tamil Tigers separatist movement. 

– ‘Way of redemption’ –

The political elite’s consultation of shamans and seers is not a phenomenon unique to Sri Lanka. 

The diminutive mystic “ET” — a moniker apparently inspired by her resemblance to the eponymous Steven Spielberg character — advised members of Myanmar’s military, who were rumoured to have relocated the country’s capital in 2005 based on astrological guidance.

Former US First Lady Nancy Reagan was also known to consult an astrologer to plan her husband’s schedule while he served in the White House.

But even with Sri Lanka seething over mismanagement of the economic crisis and allegations of graft, human rights activist and former newspaper editor Victor Ivan said the government was unlikely to abandon its faith in supernatural guidance.

“The leaders know that they have done a lot of wrong,” he told AFP. 

“Shamans and sorcerers provide them a way of redemption — that is why these people are held in such veneration by our politicians.”

The death toll from landslides and flooding in the Philippines triggered by tropical storm Megi rose to 117 on Thursday, official figures showed, as more bodies were found in mud-caked villages.

Scores of people are still missing and feared dead after the strongest storm to strike the archipelago nation this year dumped heavy rain over several days, forcing tens of thousands into evacuation centres.

In the central province of Leyte — the worst affected by Megi — devastating landslides smashed farming and fishing communities, wiping out houses and transforming the landscape.

The disaster-prone region is regularly ravaged by storms — including a direct hit from Super Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 — with scientists warning they are becoming more powerful as the world gets warmer because of climate change.

Emergency personnel in Abuyog municipality have retrieved dozens of bodies from the coastal village of Pilar that was destroyed by a landslide on Tuesday.

At least 28 people were killed and around 150 are missing, Abuyog Mayor Lemuel Traya told AFP, adding there was little hope of finding anyone else alive.

Bad weather and thick mud had complicated retrieval efforts in Pilar where the ground was unstable. Searchers were also combing the coastline after some bodies were swept kilometres away by ocean currents.

“This will not end soon, it could go on for days,” Traya warned. 

Many of those who died had hiked up a mountain to avoid flash floods, villagers told AFP. 

“It sounded like a helicopter,” said Pilar councillor Anacleta Canuto, 44, describing the noise made by the landslide.

Canuto, her husband and their two children survived, but they lost at least nine relatives.

Pilar fisherman Santiago Dahonog, 38, said he rushed into the sea with two siblings and a nephew as the landslide hurtled towards them.

“We got out of the house, ran to the water and started swimming,” he told AFP. “I was the only survivor.” 

– Scores missing in Baybay –

Another 86 people were killed and dozens injured in vegetable, rice and coconut-growing villages around Baybay City at the weekend, local authorities said. At least 117 are still missing.

The hardest hit was Kantagnos where 32 people died and 103 have not been found. 

In the nearby village of Bunga, 17 people perished when a wave of sodden soil swept down a hill and slammed into the riverside community. Only a few rooftops are visible in the mud which has started to smell of rotting flesh. 

Three people also drowned on the main southern island of Mindanao, the national disaster agency said in its latest update.

Another three deaths previously reported in the central province of Negros Oriental were dropped from the tally after they were found to be unrelated to the storm. 

Megi struck at the beginning of Holy Week, one of the most important holidays in the mainly Catholic country when thousands travel to visit relatives.

It came four months after a super typhoon devastated swathes of the country, killing more than 400 and leaving hundreds of thousands homeless.

The Philippines — ranked among the most vulnerable nations to the impacts of climate change — is hit by an average of 20 storms every year.