LAHORE: The Asif Zardari-led Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP-P) and Bilawal-led party (PPP) see differently former prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s move of leading an Islamabad-Lahore caravan less than two weeks after his ouster from power on Supreme Court orders.

The PPP-P is confining itself just “to watching the move” while the PPP thinks the PML-N step spells disaster for democracy and state institutions.

“The ex-PM is free to make his own political decision as he deems appropriate provided these are within the confines of the Constitution and law,” says PPP-P information secretary Senator Farhatullah Babar in reply to a Dawn query.

Declining to comment on Nawaz Sharif’s motives, he says his party has its own political agenda to pursue vigorously and “it will watch ex-PM’s moves on the political chessboard in normal course and as routine it is not our priority.”

The Bilawal-led PPP, as stated by its central Punjab president Qamar Zaman Kaira, thinks “the GT Road drive of Nawaz Sharif will prove disastrous for constitutional institutions as well as democracy.”

He advised the former prime minister to better focus on how to prove his innocence in NAB (National Accountability Bureau) cases.

Referring to the PML-N’s allegations of conspiracy against the Sharif government, the PPP leader sarcastically said the ex-PM had conspired against himself and allegedly plundered national wealth and rigged elections for 30 years with the connivance of the establishment but when time came for his accountability, he began talking of conspiracies.

Mr Kaira said the PML-N leader could not save himself from “the consequences of his actions”.

He alleged that Mr Sharif had been violating the Charter of Democracy and conspiring against the PPP government in connivance with (ex-CJP) Iftikhar Chaudhry and a section of the media but now was crying for the same CoD. He said Imran Khan too would soon face “the consequences of his actions” and that the PTI chief’s “bogus” integrity would be exposed.

Published in Dawn, August 7th, 2017