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KARACHI, Sept 18: The Sindh Council of the Pakistan People’s Party has decided to hold public meetings across the province from Sept 22 to Oct 10 to mobilise the party cadre for a rousing welcome to be accorded to its chairperson Ms Benazir Bhutto, who plans to arrive at the Karachi airport on Oct 18.
Briefing newsmen about the council’s meeting at the People’s Secretariat here on Tuesday, PPP Sindh chief Syed Qaim Ali Shah said that Ms Bhutto’s return would bring political stability in the country. It would also give impetus to the party’s constant efforts to drag the country out of the political turmoil, he added.
Accompanied by the party’s Information Secretary Dr Fehmida Mirza and General-Secretary of the Sindh chapter Nafees Siddiqui, Mr Shah urged the government to take concrete steps for the safety and security of the PPP chairperson on her arrival, and warned against any attempt to sabotage the welcome reception, saying that lovers of Bhutto knew to how deal with saboteurs.
He said the country was passing trough a critical phase of political uncertainty, and citizens were looking at the PPP chairperson as only her able leadership could bring about political stability.
He said that the party’s Sindh Council had decided to hold public meetings in all district headquarters of the province to organise a massive and historic welcome reception.
He said the council meeting was attended by all PPP legislators and district presidents. The council observed that PPP leaders and activists had already started holding public gathering in various districts in jubilation as soon as Ms Bhutto announced the schedule for her return home.
Mr Shah categorically denied that Ms Bhutto’s return to her homeland was in any way connected with any deal with the government, saying that the PPP and its leadership had never believed in deals with government, but they always believed in deals only with masses.
Speaking on the occasion, Nafees Siddiqui said that Gen Musharraf’s decision to doff his military uniform was a triumph of movements launched by opposition parties, civil society organisations and lawyers fraternity. He said PPP stood by its stance that it would not accept Gen Musharraf’s re-election either in uniform or without uniform. The only option acceptable to it, he added, was a presidential election in accordance with the provisions of the 1973 Constitution.
Amendment criticised
Leader of the opposition in the Senate Mian Raza Rabbani, who is Deputy Secretary-General of the Pakistan People’s Party, has termed the recent amendments to the rules governing the presidential election “unconstitutional, illegal and mala fide.”
Talking to Dawn, he maintained that the Election Commission had no powers to amend the Constitution. “It’s only parliament that can amend a constitutional provision,” he argued, and described the EC notification in this regard as “yet another subversion of the Constitution.” People would seek legal remedy and petitions would be piling up against the move, he warned.
He observed that at a time when a nine-member bench of the Supreme Court was hearing petitions pertaining to Gen Musharraf’s holding of dual offices and the issue of his uniform, such amendments by the EC were yet another act of disrespect to the judiciary and the Constitution. He said that the apex court would also be considering whether or not Article 63 of the Constitution was applicable to General Musharraf while the previous judgments of the apex court were already in place.
Mr Rabbani was of the view that the government’s mala fide intent was also clear from the fact the General Pervez Musharraf, hit by this article, had approved the amendments by himself and for himself so that he could contest the presidential election while holding the office of the army chief and ensure that the condition of two-year break after retirement should also not apply.
