LAHORE: Warning of a ‘widening divide’ between state institutions and the masses, PML-N leader Maryam Nawaz said on Sunday it “doesn’t suit armed forces and other institutions to appear as if they are standing behind a specific party”.

Speaking at the launching ceremony of her party’s Sher Jawan Movement, she said the army spokesperson [in his presser the other day] had responded to former National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq’s statement but said nothing about federal Minister Fawad Chaudhry’s remarks that are being used by the Indian prime minister to charge-sheet Pakistan.

“This discrimination should not be there. They (state institutions) are as much ours as theirs (PTI government). Such precedents should not be set that widen the divide between the public and the institutions,” she said.

She said it suited Imran Khan and his government to drag the institutions into politics but the armed forces and other institutions “should not appear as if they are standing behind a specific party”. “The ISPR DG is a professional soldier and the spokesperson for the institution. He should be very careful,” she added.

Mr Sadiq claimed last week that Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had, during the post-Pulwama army stand-off with India, urged the opposition lawmakers at the relevant parliamentary group’s meeting not to resist return of captured Indian air force pilot Abhinandan as otherwise India could attack Pakistan, whereas Fawad Chaudhry responded to it by saying that Pakistan had struck India inside their home.

Inter-Services Public Relations Director-General Maj-Gen Babar Iftikhar told a media briefing the next day that any attempt to link the release of the Indian pilot with anything other than Pakistan’s mature response as a responsible state was “disappointing” and “misleading”.

Maryam Nawaz advised the PML-N activists “not to malign the uniform” and instead “expose two or three characters who defame the armed forces by taking refuge behind the uniform”.

Referring to alleged kidnapping of the Sindh police inspector-general for coercing him to register a case against her husband relating to violation of sanctity of Quaid-i-Azam’s mausoleum in Karachi, she asked whether police uniform was inferior (to any other uniform) as the provincial police chief was “abducted and kept in isolation for refusing to arrest (retired) Captain Safdar”.

She again chose to criticise Lt-Gen retired Asim Saleem Bajwa for what she said amassing wealth worth hundreds of billions of rupees across the world despite being a salaried person.

“The nation wants to know how did you, a salaried person, begin businesses across the world? If a thrice-elected prime minister could face accountability court and I too could appear in over 200 court hearings, then what is barring General Asim Saleem Bajwa from doing so? There is no sacred cow. None has descended from the heavens,” she said, while calling for accountability of the chairman of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor Authority.

She said her father Nawaz Sharif’s only demand was punishment for those who had trampled the Constitution so that characters like [former army ruler] Gen Musharraf did not dare do so in future. “Nawaz Sharif is only talking of abiding by the Constitution, abiding by one’s oath and independence of judiciary. And the masses must not support him if his demand is in violation of the Constitution.”

The PML-N vice-president stressed that the constitution spelled out duties and rights of each institution. “It states what should be done and who should do it as well as what should not be done and who should not do what.”

She said the Sher Jawan Movement was aimed at giving political awareness to the young generation, reminding them of their objective of life and strengthening their trust in democratic system.

Published in Dawn, November 2nd, 2020