PESHAWAR: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif assured workers of his party, the PML-N, during a visit to the provincial capital on Thursday that their demands pertaining to development plans would be met.

It was the first meeting of the prime minister with his party workers in Peshawar since he formed government in the centre.

Though he did not announce any development plan for Peshawar or other districts in the province, he asked workers to give him some time for solution to their problems.

The address to the party workers convention at the Governor’s House in the city seems an attempt on part of the prime minister to please annoyed party workers, take them into confidence and mobilise them for the coming local government elections in order to give a tough time to the opposition parties, especially PTI, in the province.

Despite his assurances, the activists still have complaints against the party ministers and of the view that the federal government has yet to take serious steps for welfare of the people in the province but even then prime minister’s arrival is the ray of hope for them.

At the Governor’s House, senior PML-N activist Zulfiqar Bacha of Nowshera criticised behaviour of his party ministers with workers in the province and said in case the leadership did not take serious steps for addressing grievances of activists, the party would face humiliating situation in future elections.

According to some senior activists and office-bearers of the party, two meetings were held with PML-N president Nawaz Sharif one before the Senate elections and the other on March 18 wherein he was thoroughly briefed about the party’s falling position in the province and that was why he agreed to address workers’ convention in Peshawar.

The workers are of the opinion that the federal government has done nothing for them during its two-year tenure and they (workers) had got disappointed because the attitude of the federal ministers who were least bothered even to spare sometime and listen to the party people of the province.

Following the workers convention, several senior PML-N leaders said the major demand was of the prime minister’s visit to the province for meeting party workers.

They said they expected him to announce release of funds for party office-bearers so that they could initiate development schemes in their respective areas to compete the PTI in the province.

The leaders said none of the officials in the federal government departments like Wapda, SNGPL, FIA, Pakistan Railways, Nadra and PTCL were ready to pay heed to the problems of the PML-N workers.

They said only time would prove as to what extent the prime minister was sincere about keeping his words and resolve problems of the people in the province.

The PML-N leaders said the party’s success in elections would depend on its strategy to take some drastic steps for welfare of the people in the violence-hit province.

When contacted, Peshawar district president of the party Abdul Sattar, Vice President Waqif Khan and Rashid Mehmood Nahqai expressed the hope that the party chief was serious to do a lot for welfare of the people in the province.

They pointed out that the prolonged load shedding, ban on gas connections; delay in removal of the bars on blocked computerized national identity cards were problems of serious nature which would lay negative impact on PML-N vote bank in the province.

In a statement, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Sardar Mahtab Ahmad Khan said the acumen of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had steered the country out of crisis and put it on a course of economic development and progress.

He said when PML-N came into power country was facing the challenges of militancy, energy crises, economic instability and unemployment adding the policies of PML-N in the leadership of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had put the country on a path of development and prosperity.

The governor said the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and tribal areas have played an unforgettable role in war against militancy that would always be remembered.

He said the war against militancy was in a stage that would result in the elimination of anti-state elements.

Published in Dawn, March 27th, 2015

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