Staff Reporter
Islamabad
The PML-N and the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-F (JUI-F) have refused to attend a parliamentary leaders’s meeting called by Speaker Asad Qaiser to discuss proposals regarding the upcoming Gilgit-Baltistan elections.
The session has been convened today. Opposition leader and PML-N President Shahbaz Sharif reacted to the development by stating that Gilgit-Baltistan is a sensitive and national issue, and that it is connected with the Kashmir cause.
In a statement issued on the upcoming elections in the area, Shahbaz demanded that the federal government should not obstruct the process of transparent and free elections in GB.
He said that considering the government’s attitude, his party has decided not to cooperate with them in any way for the GB polls.
The PML-N president further said that the Speaker of the National Assembly has no authority to interfere in the electoral affairs of Gilgit-Baltistan.
Shahbaz said that he would abide by the resolutions and decisions passed at the All Parties Conference meeting.
Meanwhile, the JUI-F also withdrew from attending the meeting.
On the other hand, PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, while condemning the interference of the Centre in the general elections, said that the speaker and federal ministers have nothing to do with the elections in Gilgit-Baltistan. “The Speaker National Assembly and Federal ministers have nothing to do with elections in GB. We condemn the interference of the federal government in the elections,” the PPP leader wrote on Twitter, clarifying that the party will only be engaging with the Election Commission on our demands for fair elections. The opposition parties have started considering the suggestion for holding its first political show in Quetta on October 7, sources said. The opposition parties, however, agreed for making a formal announcement after taking all sides into confidence over date and venue of the forthcoming political gathering to begin its anti-government movement, sources added.It emerged that the suggestion was tabled by Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party Chairman Mahmood Khan Achakzai for initiating the anti-government movement on the remembrance day for the martyrs of ‘Movement for the Restoration of Democracy’.