LAHORE, May 24: Former foreign minister Sardar Assef Ahmad Ali has said the Charter of Democracy, inked by Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif in London, had overnight achieved a national consensus, comparing it with the popular appeal of the Pakistan Movement or the adoption of the Constitution in 1973.

Speaking at a seminar sponsored by the People’s Lawyers Forum here on Wednesday, Sardar said the charter was received by the people as a document through which leaders of two major political parties had pledged to rise above all considerations and work together and in cooperation with the other political organisations for undiluted democracy and to put an end to military rule for all times to come.

The consensus emerging at the seminar was that the document was the need of the hour as it stood for building national institutions and strict adherence to the Constitution which held out a commitment to a federal parliamentary democracy and dispensing with the Concurrent List of the Constitution to ensure maximum provincial autonomy.

Sardar Assef explained at length various aspects of the document, and said the two major parties also decided in principle to invite the ARD components and all other political parties to endorse the charter so that it came out as a binding commitment by all the political parties that they would implement it in letter and spirit.