KARACHI, Sept 11: Organized political parties should strengthen democracy within their ranks for which committed and trained political activists are the asset.
These views were expressed by speakers at the concluding ceremony of the first phase of the Political Party Development Programme in Sindh on Saturday. The National Democratic Institute for International Affairs in collaboration with the Centre for Civic Education-Pakistan (CCE) arranged the workshop.
Activists of the Pakistan Muslim League, the Pakistan People’s Party, the Pakistan Muslim League (N), the Muttahida Quami Movement and the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (F) participated in the workshop.
Mamnoon Hussain, provincial president of the PML-N, and Maulana Abdul Karim, provincial vice-president of the JUI-F, were present on the occasion.
US Consul in Karachi, Fredric W. Stern, was the chief guest. He distributed prizes and shields among the participants on completing the best party projects. These projects varied from developing membership databases to conducting comprehensive voter outreach activities. Certificates were also given to the participants.
Mr Stern urged the political activists to make full use of the training they gained at the NDI and CCE workshops for the betterment of their parties, province and country. He asked them to work for bringing a positive change in the politics of Sindh and in the country.
Mamnoon Hussian said that the political parties in Pakistan were not that strong because the repeated military intervention did not give them space and time to make arrangements for training of political activists. He thanked NDI and CCE for providing political activists the much needed training opportunity. He urged the political activists to work for restoration and stability of democracy in Pakistan. Maulana Abdul Karim Abid said that political parties were vital for every country because they had an important role in running the affairs of the country.
He said that activists were the backbone of a political party and the JUI-F had given due importance to its workers and that was how they work. He said in the training workshops political activists of different political parties were given an opportunity to work together. Stressing the need for more training programmes, he said that more interaction in multi-party sittings would create and promote the culture of political tolerance in the country. NDI country director Mary Cummins, CCE-Pakistan Executive Director Zafarullah Khan, and NDI senior programme manager Kelly Wright also spoke on the occasion.
NDI and CCE-Pakistan have arranged a series of training workshops for political activists in Karachi, Lahore and Quetta. Over 173 political activists, both women and men, belonging to mainstream political parties participated in these workshops. The programme aims to enhance the leadership skills of the participants and to help them understand the nature and principles of politics.
Prize for the best party project went to Roshan Ali Solangi of the PPP and Muhammad Akbar of the MQM won the excellent project award. Dr Shaheen Saeed Arain of the PML-N bagged the outstanding party project award.
