ISLAMABAD, Feb 5: An event meant to welcome a Pakistan Muslim League-Q (PML-Q) deserter into the fold of the PPP on Tuesday became a theatre of the absurd when PPP leader Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi failed to explain the rationale of accepting turncoats.

Pakistan People’s Party Punjab president Shah Mehmood Qureshi failed to respond to a volley of hard-hitting questions regarding the party’s policy of accepting those in the party who had been hands in hands with President Pervez Musharraf for the last eight years.

Mr Qureshi was speaking at a news conference arranged by the party at its Central Secretariat to welcome additional secretary general of PML-Q women wing Nasim Mirza and her husband, former director general of the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), Air Marshal (retired) Khurshid Anwar Mirza into the PPP fold.

For the past few months, there has been hardly any day when there is no news regarding joining of PML-Q members either the PML-N or the PPP, the two parties which remained on the opposition benches in the previous National Assembly despite collectively getting highest number of votes in the 2002 elections.

The PML-N leaders also face similar questions whenever they arrange a press conference to announce joining of the party by a PML-Q deserter. However, they justify the decision of accepting the turncoats by saying that the PML-Q members are joining them when they are still in the opposition.

When the reporters asked Mr Qureshi to explain the party’s policy, he simply said every citizen had the right to join any political party.

When the reporters asked Mr Qureshi as to why his party was so generous in welcoming those into the party fold who had enjoyed the fruits of being in power in the last five years, he handed over the mike to Air Marshal (retd) Khurshid Mirza to respond, instead of Nasim Mirza who was the office-bearer of the PML-Q. Mr Qureshi claimed that the two new comers were joining the party without any condition or benefit.

Mr Mirza said he was a member of the Qaumi Jamhoori Party (QJP) and had not taken any active part in political activities after the death of former minister Omar Asghar Khan. After this, he started reading from a piece of paper and said he had decided to join the PPP for four reasons. He said the number one reason was that former prime minister Benazir Bhutto sacrificed her life for the cause of democracy and in the struggle for the betterment of the people of Pakistan.

Earlier, Mr Qureshi claimed that the main contest in the Feb 18 elections would be between the PPP and the PML-N in urban and southern parts of Punjab. He, however, said the PML-Q was at number two in some rural areas of Punjab. He expressed the hope that the PPP would be able to form its government in Punjab after more than three decades. “If free and fair elections are held, the PPP will emerge as the single largest party in the province,” he said.

Responding to a question, he said his party would review the stock market scam and the scandal of the Pakistan Steel Mills’ privatization after coming into power. Referring to former prime minister Shaukat Aziz, the PPP leader said a person who had served the country as finance minister and then the prime minister for eight years had left the country silently after failing to get a single constituency to contest the election.

The PPP leader alleged that nazims in many areas were openly supporting the PML-Q candidates in violation of the election code of conduct. He alleged that District Coordinator Officer (DCO) of Khanewal Maj (retd) Shakil was calling the nazims asking them to support the PML-Q candidates. He said the DCO had himself told him that he had been doing this on the directives of the chief minister.