Abdul Hadi Mayar Islamabad
The verbal all-is-will statements by federal ministers and PML-N leaders apart, the body language and behavior of government functionaries clearly show that the reports of possible talks between Tehrik-e-Insaf and the army have disgruntled Shehbaz Sharif government.
“There is no possibility of talks between the army and the PTI,” Information Minister Atta Tarar said in a television interview Wednesday.
Other similar tow tone voices are also emanating from government quarters. But the bombastic rhetoric usually emitted by the like of Khawaja Asif and Rana Sanaullah are no more there.
“Reports about the illness of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had also come in this very background. The Prime Minister was scheduled to visit Tehran to attend the oath-taking of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian but he cancelled his trip at the eleventh hour under this disgruntlement,” informed sources in Islamabad confided to this scribe.
Observers say the honeymoon between the establishment and the PML-N government is already over. Differences between the government and the institutions had, in fact, surfaced during preparation of the federal budget when Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif threatened to resign over demand for heavy taxes. “It was this discontent between the government and the institutions that gave courage to Imran Khan to come forward and try to fill the vacuum,” the sources said citing the boldness of the PTI founder who even blamed the army for execution of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and the fall of Dhaka.
Muhammad Ali Durrani, a former federal minister, said that days of Sharif government are counted and that the change will take place inside the parliament.
Though the government is trying its level best to keep PTI deprived of its 41 special seats but if the judiciary intervenes and ensures implementation of the Supreme Court decision in the special seats case, PTI is all set to emerge as the largest single party in the parliament.
“But Imran Khan would not agree on anything less than fresh general elections which has bright chances once Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa retired in October and the new Supreme Court has its field day in Islamabad,” the sources said.
