May 14, 2006	Sunday	Rabi-us-Sani 15, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, May 13: PML-N’s acting parliamentary leader in the National Assembly Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan says that signing of the charter of democracy by his party and the PPP on Sunday is the first step and they want to bring all political forces on board in the next step that will take four to six weeks.

Talking to Dawn before his departure to London for the signing ceremony of the charter, he said the country’s intelligentsia too would be brought on board in the third stage of the process that would be completed before August.

Mr Khan said the charter would basically be a message to the people of Pakistan that the political parties had learnt a lesson from history. “We believe that we will be able to restore our credibility to some extent through this charter,” he added.

Mr Khan said he had heard a lot of people, both on the streets and among intelligentsia, questioning the opposition’s capacity to bring public onto the streets but he pointed to similar doubts voiced before street agitation toppled Ayub Khan in 1969 in the midst of celebrations of his so-called “decade of development”.

Asked why opposition parties were unable to unite on one platform, he said the main reason could be their personal weaknesses. He said he had been telling other opposition parties in various meetings that if their objective was the revival of the 1973 constitution and the ushering in of a democratic order, then they should not be worried as to who would enjoy the political fruits of any future change.

He said another issue was “the game of the government” to exploit parties and leaders with a “baggage”. Moreover, he said some of the opposition leaders were also playing with the media. Responding to a question about the PPP’s role, Mr Khan said he could say it categorically that the PPP leaders had made up their minds and were very clear now. “I think there is no going back now as far as the ARD, the PPP or the PML-N is concerned. The regional parties are also totally on board,” he added.

Referring to his meetings with some US diplomats, the PML-N leader said he had always told them that in the last 58 years of history, Pakistan had invested very heavily in friendship with America, but when they became the only super power in the world, Pakistan seemed to be the biggest loser. He said Pakistani people might be very simple and uneducated but they were very perceptive and asked questions how Gen Musharraf all of a sudden became a good friend of the US after receiving a telephone call in the darkness of the night. He said he had told the US diplomats that uneducated villagers had been raising such questions in Pakistan. “And now the more unpopular Gen Musharraf gets, the more unpopular the Americans get. It is a vicious circle,” he said.

“When we have a dictator who is perceived to be dancing to foreign tunes and selling off interests of Pakistan — he might not be selling off but he is perceived to be selling the interests of Pakistan to a foreign power in return for securing his chair — that is like mixing drugs with alcohol, and that is the perception of the streets,” he said. “You see when people stumble on the pavement, they first abuse Musharraf and then the US.”

Mr Khan said he thought the US would have learnt a lesson from what happened in Iran where they had “put all their eggs in the king’s basket” and when he went, the whole of Iran turned against the US. “Similarly, in the Philippines, they put all eggs in the basket of Marcos, (and the same happened) in Chile and in Indonesia. But they haven’t learnt any lesson. And now every day which passes, the situation is being aggravated and anti-American feelings are being aggravated.”