GUJRAT: The Pakistan People’s Party is going to launch its mass-contact drive from central Punjab by holding a workers’ convention in Gujranwala city on Tuesday (today).

Party chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari will address the convention at Ghulam Hussain Park near city’s flyover along GT Road.

Gujranwala district PPP president and ex-MPA Ijaz Samman told Dawn that the party had almost completed preparations for the event.

He said party’s central Punjab chapter had decided to hold the convention at the divisional level and Gujranwala was selected as the first venue in the province.

A former PPP federal minister Imtiaz Safdar Warraich and PPP Gujranwala city president Mian Wadood Hassan Dar, his brother ex-MPA from Gakhar Mandi town Mian Saud Hassan Dar and other local leaders had been holding corner meetings in various parts of the city and its surrounding rural localities to muster public support and more participation of the people in the party’s event.

Gujrat PPP leader Mian Fakhar Mushtaq Pagganwala said that party’s central Punjab president and former prime minister Raja Parvez Ashraf had earlier held a meeting of party’s officials from across the Gujranwala and Gujrat regions and asked them to ensure participation of maximum number of people in the convention.

Meanwhile, Jamaat-e-Islami’s North Punjab chapter has finalized its candidates for 30 constituencies out of total 33 NA seats in 13 districts, including Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

Punjab North JI emir Dr Tariq Saleem told Dawn out of the total 61 Punjab Assembly constituencies of the north region, the party has completed the homework of fielding candidates against 56 PA seats and vowed to field the candidates for the remaining three NA and five PA seats.

Mr Saleem has also been a party candidate for PP-28 (Kotla, Gujrat).

Published in Dawn, December 12th, 2023