SUKKUR, July 10: The ARD convention, held in a marriage hall here on Wednesday, has demanded President Gen Pervez Musharraf’s resignation and the formation of a caretaker government to hold the forthcoming elections.

The speakers criticized the role of the army in the national affairs and called its return to the barracks.

Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan said the country’s politicians had been facing military dictators since 1958 because they believed in democratic values. “On all occasions, these military dictators including Ayub, Yahya, and Zia were toppled as a result of mass struggle and Gen Musharraf would also have to go.”

He said that the government was trying to impose a presidential system, which would neither be federal nor parliamentary nor presidential system of the government.

He finds it funny when President Musharraf says that the proposed constitutional amendments and the National Security Council were meant to block the army’s entry into country’s political affairs.

He said that India had amassed its troops in Nagaland, Mizoran, Assam, “and other troubled states on our borders, but our chief of army staff was resting in the presidential palace”.

He said that the majority of the people hated him and if he wants proof of this he must give up his army uniform and contest elections. He said it was up to the civilian government to take a decision in case of war, and cited a quotation of Churchill who had said that a civil government could not shift the responsibility of war on the army.

He said Gen Musharraf and his colleagues did not have the courage to face political parties, therefore, they had planned to block the entry of Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto by inducting clauses in the Constitutional amendment package, which would bar them from becoming prime minister for a third term.

He said that the rulers should hand over power to a caretaker government to hold elections through a neutral and independent Election Commission.

Others who spoke at the convention were: Syed Khurshid Ahmed Shah, Syed Qaim Ali Shah (PPP), Zain Ansari, Pir Ali Shah (PML-N), and Basharat Mirza (PDP).

They said in their speeches that Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto could not be stopped from returning to Pakistan, and that they were confident that they would secure a landslide victory in the elections.