LAHORE: Pakistan People’s Party Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari will lead an anti-government rally of the party from the provincial metropolis to Faisalabad on Thursday.

On way to Faisalabad, he will deliver brief speeches at public meetings to be held at Sheikhupura, Nankana Sahib and Shahkot, PPP central Punjab chapter chief Qamar Zaman Kaira told reporters here on Tuesday.

The party has made a written request to the Punjab government seeking permission for the rally, while the police have also been approached for provision of proper security to the event.

It is learnt that the special truck late Benazir Bhutto would use during the party’s rallies has been transported to Lahore to be used by her son for the Faisalabad rally.

The rally is part of Bilawal’s plan to boost morale of party activists in Punjab who had gone into dormancy because of PPP’s “reconciliation policy” towards the ruling PML-N and distancing of the leadership from workers during the last eight years or so.

He had earlier announced shifting all his political activities to Lahore and making Bilawal House his base camp to reactivate jiyalas in Punjab, once considered a stronghold of PPP that gradually slipped out of its hands to the benefit of the PML-N.

Bilawal is also scheduled to address a press conference on Wednesday (today).

Published in Dawn, January 18th, 2017