LAHORE, July 25: PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif says PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto has backed out of her own suggestion of submitting en bloc resignations in case Gen Musharraf attempted to get himself re-elected from the incumbent assemblies.

Mr Sharif told his party leaders at the recently-held multi-party conference in London that Ms Bhutto had been persuading him for two years to be on the forefront while taking a joint decision on the issue, a top official of the PML-N told Dawn here on Wednesday.

The official also quoted Mr Sharif as saying that the proposal for convening the MPC had also come from Ms Bhutto.

The changed stance of the PPP chairperson on both the issues really hurt the PML-N leader and played a major role in making up his mind to part ways with the PPP by forming another alliance of like-minded parties, he added.

Mr Sharif was so much committed on the resignation issue that he took exception to a party leader’s proposal of giving a tough time to the rulers at the re-election time by staying in assemblies instead of leaving the field open to them, he said.

The PPP chairperson had deleted from the MPC declaration the clause regarding resignations when it was e-mailed to her two days before the event.

“Now our paths are separate,” the official quoted Mr Sharif as saying when he was told of the development. He said the party believed that Ms Bhutto had used the PML-N during this episode for improving her bargaining position with Gen Musharraf.

As a counter move, the PML-N decided to isolate the PPP by bringing a maximum number of opposition parties on board on the resignation issue. Under a strategy Mr Sharif delivered opening speech of the MPC in which policy line for achieving the desired results was given, he said.

The then MMA president, Qazi Husain Ahmad, was insisted to deliver the second speech of the event instead of giving the rostrum to Makhdoom Amin Fahim, representing the PPP (the largest party in the MPC), for strengthening the views earlier expressed by Mr Sharif, the official said.

The PML-N official said the post-MPC meeting of the party analysed that the event had showed the masses that Nawaz Sharif was openly ready to challenge the army dictator without attaching any ifs and buts with his stance.

It was also felt that the stance had given a boost to the morale of the party workers and they would now be more committed to contribute to it.

A majority of the participants, led by Tehmina Daultana, was of the view that now the Sharifs must return.

The meeting noted with satisfaction that not only religious groups but also nationalist parties, which had so far been considered as separatists, were now assembled at a platform (All-Party Democratic Front) being led by Mr Sharif.