KARACHI, Dec 4: Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) on Wednesday criticized the government for blatant “horse-trading” in Sindh to install a government of its choice.

The PML-N Chief Organizer Chaudhry Ahsan Iqbal, briefing newsmen during his stay in the metropolis, referred to the postponement of the Sindh Assembly’s inaugural session and alleged that the rigging by the government, before, during and after the polling, had broken all previous records.

He said President Gen Pervez Musharraf’s theory of straightening civil affairs through army intervention had failed to yield result during his three-year military rule.

Ahsan Iqbal, flanked by Sindh PML-N Secretary-General Mamnoon Hussain and Syed Hafeezuddin Ahmad, said the performance of national institutions had declined and people had lost faith even in the judiciary. He said the economy had deteriorated so much that sovereignty of the country had been bargained away for peanuts.

Criticizing those who were keen to assign a political role to the army instead of strengthening its professional character, he warned that giving a political role to the military would become a stumbling block in the smooth functioning of democratic process and for political stability. He said stability in the country could only return if the army withdrew from indulging in politics.

The PML-N leader recalled that Gen Musharraf had been taunting former prime minister Nawaz Sharif for carrying out constitutional amendments through parliament within minutes but he himself was not prepared to place his amendments before parliament even for a few seconds.

He said Gen Musharraf’s predecessors, Gen Ayub Khan, Gen Yahya Khan and Gen Ziaul Haq, had got their constitutional packages and decisions endorsed by the following parliaments but he considered himself above the institution.

He warned that if Gen Musharraf failed to get indemnity for his actions from parliament, he could not save himself from the Article 6 of the Constitution, pertaining to high treason.

He castigated the claim of Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz about raising foreign exchange reserves to $11 billion and asked what the utility of the reserves was if it failed to ensure two meals a day for the common men, who had been forced to commit suicides with their children due to poverty.

Terming the claim a juggling of figures, he said that by mortgaging the economy of the country to the dictates of the International Monetary Fund, the foundations for its revival laid by the Nawaz government had been eroded by the policies of Gen Musharraf.

He said the PML-N was the only alternative to the policies of Gen Musharraf as it had been playing the role of opposition while the other parties had been opposing the government and supporting it at the same time.

In reply to a question, he said the PML-N would never give up its principled stand and would not be a party to the conspiracy of Gen Musharraf of imposing an unconstitutional democracy.

He said his party would continue to strive for supremacy of the 1973 Constitution and for a sovereign parliament.

He said the way government had been formed in Balochistan by releasing two leaders convicted of corruption was shameful and now the same game was being staged in Sindh.