KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples Party chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on Thursday warned that the people of Pakistan would not allow anyone to make the Senate elections controversial and give Imran Khan and the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf majority through “back door” using unfair means.

“We will not allow anyone to rob our strength in parliament,” he said while addressing his party workers at the residence of newly elected Sindh Assembly member Yousuf Murtaza Baloch from PS-88 Malir.

The PPP chairman visited his house to congratulate the new PPP legislator and meet the activists in the constituency.

Addressing the PPP workers, he said: “Why anyone didn’t take notice when the people’s rights were robbed in 2018 general elections? It will be an attack on democracy if the right of secret ballot and voluntary voting of the members of the assembly is taken away by force.”

He described the presidential reference regarding Senate elections as a no-confidence motion against the ruling PTI’s own assembly members saying that some government members had been contacting the PPP for tickets in advance because they knew that this government would go very soon.

Says rulers have suffered defeats in recent by-elections

To rig the Senate elections, the PTI government attempted to use the shoulders of the Election Commission of Pakistan and the Supreme Court, he claimed.

Mr Bhutto-Zardari added that the people would not allow anyone to make the Senate elections controversial, nor would anyone dare to give “Mr Niazi” a majority through the “back door”.

He said that it would be an attack on democracy if the right of secret ballot and voluntary voting of members of the assembly was taken away.

“If the rulers have confidence in their members then why they want to come through the back door; they should accept the opposition’s challenge and fight democratically,” the PPP chairman said.

The PPP chairman said that he was fighting against the selected government on all fronts to defeat the opponents. From Karachi to Sanghar, from Sanghar to Pishin, where by-elections had taken place, the selected government suffered defeat with its “candidates getting their securities confiscated”, he added.

Published in Dawn, February 19th, 2021