ISLAMABAD: In what appeared to be a message to certain political and religious elements, PPP Co-Chairman and former president Asif Ali Zardari said the PPP would not permit anyone to impose any peculiar agenda through brute force and using the facade of religion.

"The party is also conscious of threats to democracy in the name of democracy itself and is determined to foil them," Zardari said in a statement issued in relation to the 47th founding day of the party which falls on November 30.

"Our founding principles ‘democracy is our politics’ and ‘all power to the people’ are ingrained in the consciousness of the people and will never be erased," he said.

He said this year the Pakistan Peoples Party was celebrating its founding day by holding conventions of party workers for stock-taking and soul-searching as well as for reiterating its commitment to the ideals for the pursuit of which the it was founded by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

"We reiterate that all power belongs to the people and they alone have the power to bring about political change through the ballot box," he remarked.

*Also read: PPP diehards worried to see Zardari in ‘losers company’*

Zardari said that while the threat of imposition of direct dictatorship may appear to have receded, PPP was not unmindful of the other forms of "threats to democracy that rear their ugly heads from time to time".

"The PPP is aware of such threats and is ready to fight them," he said.

Zardari's spokesman Senator Farhatullah Babar said all preparations had been completed for the party convention which would take place in Lahore tomorrow.

He said two sessions of the convention would be held in Bilawal House Lahore which would be attended by workers and party officials from all over the country.

The session on November 30 would be attended by party workers and leaders from Punjab. Meanwhile, the workers and office bearers from all other provinces, Azad Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan and tribal areas would join the convention on December 2. All members of the central executive committee of the party have been directed to appear at both sessions of the convention, he said.

More on this: Remembering the (real) PPP