Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari’s comments on Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif’s Gujranwala and Quetta statements will be a topic of discussion at the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) meeting today.
PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto said that he was “blindsided” when former prime minister Nawaz Sharif named top military leadership in a Pakistan Democratic Moment rally last month, BBC Urdu reported Friday.
The PPP chairman sent shockwaves within the PDM and a storm in political circles on Friday with his remarks in an interview with the BBC over Sharif’s blistering attack on the current military leadership by name in a public meeting last month in Gujranwala.
Admitting being blindsided by the speech, Bilawal hoped Sharif would soon reveal evidence to support the statement. “We avoid such comments during public gatherings. No-one person can be held responsible for bringing (current prime minister) Imran Khan to power,” the young Bhutto scion told the BBC.
Both Bilawal’s mother — Benazir Bhutto — and grandfather Zulfikar Ali Bhutto were former prime ministers. His party’s supporters and many political pundits see him potentially following their path in the future.
Bilawal’s remarks are being seen as a blow to the newly-formed opposition alliance, and were peddled with glee by the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government.
As well as discuss this, the PDM hopes to devise a strategy to deal with the eventuality of a response by the government including crackdowns on workers or leaders at any point in time during the movement.
PDM president Maulana Fazlur Rehman, a firebrand cleric and chief of his own Jamiat Ulema Islam party, will take his colleagues into confidence on the desire of some parties to join the alliance, according to a report published in The News, a leading English daily.
It said the PDM will also discuss the federal government’s alleged defiance of electoral laws and “pre-poll rigging” ahead of the Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) legislative assembly elections including Prime Minister Imran Khan’s decision to announce provisional provincial status for the northern region.
It is unlikely that PML-N vice president Maryam Nawaz and Bilawal would attend the meeting owing to their GB campaign. The PDM will also discuss inflation, “worsening law and order situation” and other matters.
The impact of US presidential outcome on the region as well as resulting international situation would also figure in the discussion.
IN THE EYE OF A STORM: PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari (right) created a stir with his comments to BBC about how PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif’s name-calling of the military leadership for his ouster from power at the Gujranwala public meeting took him by surprise.