PPP leader Shazia Marri on Saturday said that if the coalition government took a “u-turn” on its commitments, the party would not only boycott the upcoming budget but would also take a “more serious step”.

Tensions between the PML-N-led coalition and the PPP have simmered for months over unfulfilled promises. A December meeting between Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and President Asif Ali Zardari seemingly failed to resolve disagreements, with PPP Senator Saleem Mandviwalla later claiming the PM’s Office ignored directives from the Presidency.

Amid strained ties, PML-N leaders met PPP counterparts at Governor House on Saturday, assuring them they wouldn’t be treated as outsiders in Punjab.

Speaking during the DawnNewsTV programme Doosra Rukh yesterday, PPP leader Marri said that her party would not only boycott he upcoming budget but would also adopt a “more serious step” if the government failed to fulfil its commitments regarding the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP).

“If the prime minister and the minister for planning and development do not fulfil the commitment regarding PSDP […] if they take a u-turn this time, then I think we will not only boycott the budget but will take a more serious step,” she said, without elaborating what that step entailed.

Marri said that the country was not in the position to endure such steps and that the government should have thought about its decision first, adding that her party was not under any compulsion; rather, it had stakes due to its “maturity and political wisdom”.

“I think this is a very delicate government, and I don’t think there has ever been a government as weak as this one,” she said. “And this weak government is not realising the situation it is in, how much it needs the PPP,” she said.

In January, the PPP held a meeting of its Central Executive Committee (CEC), where it demanded that the federal government held local government polls in Punjab and Islamabad as per the agreement it had made with the ruling coalition.

The PPP has also repeatedly voiced concern over the construction of controversial canals in Punjab’s Cholistan area.

It has called for the immediate meeting of the Council of Common Interests (CCI), which has been pen­ding for 11 months, calling for the canal issue to be raised there.