PESHAWAR, Oct 17: The parliamentary leader of the People’s Party Parliamentarians in the NWFP Assembly, Mr Abdul Akbar Khan, has demanded that the government should invite PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto and Pakistan Muslim League president Mian Nawaz Sharif to attend the All Parties Conference proposed to be convened in Islamabad to discuss the current situation.

Speaking to journalists at the assembly building, Mr Khan said the nation was facing a great crisis caused by the earthquake of Oct 8, while the rulers were playing a political game to gag dissenting voices and concentrate all powers in their persons.

He regretted that leader of the house and elected Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and chief of the ruling PML Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain were so powerless that they could not convene the APC themselves. He said both the leaders had begged to President Gen Pervez Musharraf to call an APC.

He asked the federal government to set up a joint committee of MNAs and MPAs from the NWFP to supervise the reconstruction of towns and rehabilitation of affected people.

He said it was time to invite the political leadership to play its role in nation building.

He said the loss of life and property, particularly destruction of government buildings in upper Hazara, had exposed the successive governments which had used substandard material in the construction of schools, colleges and hospitals.

Mr Khan said presence of Ms Bhutto and Mr Sharif in the country would strengthen the political process. He expressed the hope that the government would work for building national consensus on important issues.