HYDERABAD, April 22: Speaker after speaker criticized President Gen Pervez Musharraf’s remarks that he would only address a “civilized” parliament, and would not tolerate such an attitude on his part. They said that the rulers wanted to pack up parliament in the name of the Legal Framework Order.

Speaking at a one-day seminar on the topic of ‘Concept of people’s rule’ here on Tuesday, Sindh People’s Party Parliamentarians president and leader of the opposition in the Sindh Assembly Nisar Khuhro maintained that the current crisis was a battle between the LFO and people’s rule and only one of them would survive, and added that Gen Musharraf had defaced the Constitution while taking advantage of the apex court’s verdict.

He said that the generals drew their salaries from the taxes paid by the masses and yet they rode roughshod over their aspirations by passing contemptuous remarks against their representatives in the National Assembly.

He further said since members of parliament had asked Gen Musharraf to present the LFO before the house for debate, he had now started ridiculing them.

Mr Khuhro pointed out that it was the 1973 Constitution which made it mandatory that the armed forces were supposed to obey the orders of the civilian government and there was no mention of the fact that a serving officer could become president.

About the Sindh chief minister’s statement on the Thal canal, he said that he had rejected the views of even his own colleagues who had supported the resolutions against the Thal canal and the NFC award.

He said that even Sindh ministers were calling for lifting of ban on jobs.

MPAs Zahid Bhurgari and Shazia Marri, PPP Sindh General Secretary Rashid Rabbani, Deputy General Secretary Maula Bux Chandio, acting President Sagheer Qureshi, Shah Mohammad Shah and others also criticized President Gen Musharraf.

They regretted that even the prime minister was talking about packing up of parliament.