MANSEHRA, June 22: Former MNA and NWFP Pakistan People's Party President women wing Mehrun Nissa Afridi has said the present regime has failed to solve the problems of the people.

Speaking at a press conference here on Tuesday, she said the unprecedented price-hike and unemployment had made the life of people miserable and even the payment of utility bills had become difficult for the common man.

PPP leaders Malik Waheed, Malik Arshad Sultan, provincial PPP women wing's office-bearers Farhana Begum, Shakeela Hussain, Shabnum Awan and Naeema Nisar were also present on the occasion.

Ms Afridi said the recent raise in the government employees' salaries announced in the budget was just an eyewash, a gimmick and a jugglery of words as the rulers had risen the prices of items of daily use simultaneously.

She maintained that solving the people's problems was the job of politicians and not of the generals. The PPP leader said the military rulers should learn from the history of East Pakistan debacle and shun the policy of sidelining the real political leadership of the country.

She urged the military rulers to hand over power to the real representatives of the people and return to their barracks to save the country from any big crisis. Ms Afridi said the Bhutto family was victimised by the successive military rulers despite the sacrifices it had rendered for protecting the nuclear programme of the country, uniting the Muslim Ummah, strengthening democracy and struggling for the rights of the downtrodden people.

She said the morale of the PPP leadership in the hour of trial had always been very high, which was evident from the courage of Asif Ali Zardari, who, despite being persecuted for the last nine years, had not entered into any secret deal with the rulers.

The PPP leader said only the Bhutto family had the charisma of leading the party, and the people like Jatoi, Leghari and Sherpao, by parting ways with the Bhutto family, had lost their credibility.

To a question about Wana operation, Ms Afridi remarked: "We condemn all sorts of terrorism and extremism but we are also against the killing of the Muslims." Expressing her apprehensions about Wana operation, she said: "Pakistan is on the verge of a bloodbath", which had started from Afghanistan and Iraq.