Observer Report
Karachi
The top leadership of the Pakistan Muslim League-N and the Pakistan People’s Party on Wednesday decided to join forces against National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and resist the arrests of leaders from the two opposition parties.
This was decided during a meeting between PML-N President and Leader of the Opposition Shahbaz Sharif and PPP Co-Chairman and former President Asif Ali Zardari at Bilawal House, Karachi. Other leaders from both parties also attended the meeting. It was decided during the meeting that the government has resorted to high-handed tactics to stop political activists from fighting for public rights, which would be jointly resisted, sources privy to the development said.
They said that PML-N leaders suggested liaising with all like-minded parties in the Parliament during the meeting. It was also decided to announce the date of All Parties Conference in consultation with all opposition parties. The PPP delegation included Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah and PPP Sindh President Nisar Khuhro, Farhatullah Babar, Syed Naveed Qamar, Waqar Mehdi and Aajez Dhamra.
PML-N delegation included Ahsan Iqbal, Marriyum Aurangzeb, Zubair Ahmed, Rana Mashhood and Shah Muhammad Shah.
Meanwhile, PPP leaders Naveed Qamar and Farhatullah Babar and PML-N’s Ahsan Iqbal and Marriyum Aurangzeb, addressing a joint press conference after a meeting between delegations of both parties, reiterated their commitment to using all “democratic and constitutional ways” available to send the government packing. During the press conference, both parties berated the federal government and lamented that “the fundamental rights of Pakistanis were being usurped”. PML-N’s Iqbal said that both parties have agreed to “struggle for the supremacy of the Constitution, independent courts and free media”.“If [we are to] run this country and make it successful, it is only possible if we blindly follow the 1973 Constitution that is in line with the vision of Quaid-i-Azam,” he said. Addressing the differences between the opposition and government over proposed laws pertaining to money laundering, terror financing. etc, Iqbal said that Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had thanked Sharif in a letter after similar bills were passed by both houses earlier. But the opposition had blocked the passage of newly introduced bills because the government wanted to pass a “black law” under the garb of complying with the Financial Action Task Force requirements.
PPP’s Babar seconded Iqbal’s statement and alleged that through the new law, the government wanted to “legalise” people being picked up without charges.
Both PPP and PML-N will attend the Rehbar Committee meeting today, where the date for the multi-party conference will also be decided, it was announced. The opposition leaders said that the government’s accountability process was one-sided and that no one affiliated with the ruling party was being held accountable or questioned.
