PESHAWAR, April 6: The Pakistan People’s Party has termed the proposed presidential referendum a farce and advised the military regime to seek “qualification and disqualification” of PPP Chairperson Benazir Bhutto from the people through a referendum.

In a statement issued here on Saturday, a PPP spokesman said that his party had rejected the proposed referendum, which aimed at legalizing the ultra-constitutional steps of Gen Musharraf and to allow him to prolong his (Musharraf’s) autocratic rule in the country.

He said the government wanted to trap political forces of the country through the referendum, but the people would foil all the shenanigans of the rulers.

He said although Gen Musharraf was neither like Gen Ayub Khan nor like Gen Ziaul Haq, but he too was a dictator like both of his predecessors and not a people’s representative.

The spokesman vowed that the PPP with the help of other political forces would make the referendum a failure for the rulers.

Gen Musharraf, he said, had no right to oust Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif from politics. Only 14 million people of Pakistan had the right to decide about the fate of politicians, he added.

In a separate statement, Arbab Khizer Hayat Khan, a leader of the PML (N), outright rejected the referendum.

He said Gen Musharraf’s address to the nation was a gimmick as he sensationalised the issues to divert the attention of the people to get their support.

The PML(N) leader said the country was facing worst law and order situation and murderers were on the loose. Likewise, the prices of items of everyday use had skyrocketed. He said the foreign policy of Pakistan was also in a shambles.

Gen Pervez Musharraf, he said, repeatedly talked about the establishment of democracy in Pakistan, however, he himself was violating the Constitution by getting himself elected through unlawful means.