PESHAWAR: The disgruntled activists of PPP have delayed their plan of forming parallel units of the party and decided to give more time to the central leadership to address their grievances.

However, they will not support the candidates of tripartite alliance comprising PPP, ANP and JUI-F in the upcoming local government elections.

Earlier, the annoyed workers of PPP had fixed the deadline of April 10 to the leadership for acceptance of their demands regarding announcement of schedule for the intra-party elections. They had threatened to form their own organisational units of the party in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

However, in a recent development the annoyed activists delayed materialisation of their plan. “The formation of parallel units is a point of no return and thus the senior leaders preferred to give another chance to the party high command for acceptance of the demands,” sources, privy to a recently held meeting of the disgruntled workers, told Dawn.

They said that PPP co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari had already formed a two-member committee comprising Sheri Rehman and Raja Pervez Ashraf to visit Peshawar and hold meetings with the party’s office bearers and annoyed activists.

Decide not to support candidates of tripartite alliance in LG polls

The committee members, they said, were supposed to visit Peshawar till April 10 but they did not come which increased doubts among workers about sincerity of the leadership to take serious notice of the existing differences in the party.

“We have heard that Faryal Talpur is also due to visit Peshawar before the local government elections to remove internal differences in the party and enable its candidates to win the elections in all the districts with thumping majority,” the annoyed activists said.

Syed Ayub Shah, a leader of the disgruntled workers, when contacted, said that formation of parallel party organisations was delayed because they were not against PPP rather wanted reforms in the party.

When asked about their plan for the forthcoming local government elections, he said that it was not necessary for them to support the candidates of tripartite alliance. He said that they would vote only for the loyal workers of PPP. “It is not mandatory on us to support workers of other parties because we have objection over alliance with ANP,” he said.

Mr Shah said that the annoyed activists were ideological people, who did not want to harm the party. “We only want implementation of the party’s manifesto and introduction of democratic culture so that it could regain its past status in the country,” he said.

Mr Shah urged the central leadership to pay attention to the demands of the unhappy workers and enable them to choose office-bearers of their choice and work wholeheartedly for the party.

PPP provincial spokesman Liaquat Shabab could not be contacted by telephone for getting his version. However, PPP former provincial president Rahimdad Khan dispelled the impression that partly leadership would accept demands of the disgruntled workers.

“There is no agreement with the annoyed people regarding replacement of the office-bearers or intra-party elections,” he said and added that those violating the party’s discipline had no status among the workers.

He said that there was no chance of Faryal Talpur’s visit to Peshawar to talk to the annoyed workers. “The only purpose of her visit will be to play role for reactivating the party workers for the local government elections in the province,” he said.

Mr Kahn said that the tripartite alliance was intact and efforts were being made to field consensus candidates across the province. However, he admitted that in some areas the alliance was facing problems in devising seat adjustment formula.

Published in Dawn, April 14th, 2015

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