The ruling PTI party and the opposition PML-N found themselves embroiled in a twitter war on Saturday as they exchanged digs and barbs with each other in lengthy twitter threads on the state and direction of the economy, as well as the quality of economic management of each party.

The trigger for the heated exchange was the press conference held by former Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbassi on Thursday in which he assailed the ruling party’s economic policies and said that the country is heading towards a deep economic crisis.

This did not set well with the PTI as it took to Twitter and posted a series of 10 tweets in which it not only criticised Abbasi for what they termed were attempts to “mislead the public”, but also issued corrections and clarifications in response to the 'claims' he had made in the press conference.

“The former prime minister said that ‘inflation is at 10-year high’ which is not true. The CPI inflation was between 5.9-7.9% also reaching 10.9% in 2013-14 during PML-N and had crossed 20% under the PPP government. Whereas, in 5 months of the PTI tenure inflation is between 5.8-6.2%,” read one tweet by PTI.

PML-N responded a day later with 14 tweets, alleging that the “PTI has failed to revive exports and has brought manufacturing activity to decline”.

“One big reason for the forced recession is the inability [of the PTI government] to decide once and for all if they will go to the IMF programme. Please decide and let the markets know,” read another tweet.

The PML-N capped off its comeback with: "You can’t tweet your way out of a recession."