Most of the opposition leaders backed Ms Benazir’s allegations about the role of intelligence agencies in the attack and said there were elements sympathetic to extremists.
In a press statement issued on Friday, Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal’s president Qazi Husain Ahmad said the attack on the procession was aimed at warning political parties against pursuing the goal of democracy.
Expressing condolences over deaths of PPP workers and policemen, he announced that the MMA would also observe three-day mourning to express solidarity with the PPP.
MMA’s secretary-general Maulana Fazlur Rehman said the government had failed to protect the lives of innocent people and called for a judicial probe. He said that the alliance shared PPP’s grief.
MMA’s deputy secretaries-general Liaquat Baloch and Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, Punjab JUI Amir Syed Amir Husain Gilani and information secretary Maulana Mohammad Amjad also expressed grief.
A message sent by president of the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Istiqlal Air Marshal (retd) Asghar Khan said the attack was the culmination of continued military rule that promoted terrorism to safeguard its vested interests. According to him, the situation was a matter of great concern and it could only be remedied by an end to the rule of undemocratic forces.
Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf chairperson Imran Khan blamed the incident on the government’s pro-US policies and said that the Musharraf government had found support of certain other parties, including the PPP. He said that the government’s wrong policies had only helped increase the radicalisation and growth of militancy. He said the only way to eliminate the threat of terrorism was for the political parties to win the hearts and minds of the people.