LONDON, Dec 7: President Gen Pervez Musharraf’s recent warning to former prime minister Nawaz Sharif not to contemplate returning home before the end of his 10-year entry ban seems to have redoubled the PML (N) leader’s determination to go back to Pakistan before the forthcoming elections.

In what appeared to be a well-thought out response to Gen Musharraf’s reiteration in a recent interview to an Indian TV channel that he would be sent back to Saudi Arabia like his brother Shahbaz Sharif was if Nawaz attempted to return home for the 2007 elections, the PML (N) chief said he would go to Pakistan to participate in the elections no matter what the odds.

In a statement issued by the international secretariat of the party here on Thursday, the top PML (N) leadership termed Gen Musharraf’s statement a reflection of the dictatorship’s fear of the PML-N’s popularity and part of his pre-poll rigging. The party leaders said that the PML (N) chief would return to Pakistan before the elections as a matter of right.

In a resolution passed during the ongoing meetings of the district coordinators of the party here on Thursday, the PML (N) called upon Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif to prepare for their return to Pakistan before the elections.

The resolution also demanded that PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto be also allowed to return to Pakistan.