The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) could not reach consensus on the strategy to bring no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Imran Khan as the top leadership of both the opposition parties met in Bilawal House on Tuesday.
It was the second meeting between PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and its Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari in weeks. Shehbaz had accepted a dinner invitation by PPP to discuss the anti-government move. Opposition parties decided to hold another sitting on Wednesday (today) after hours’ long discussion and did not speak to the media.
Sources said that PML-N would host the meeting and also invited Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) President Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman to it.
Shehbaz they said, decided to support the PPP long march on February 27 and would give it a welcome in Lahore.
PML-N’s Ahsan Iqbal, Khawaja Saad Rafiq, Maryam Aurangzeb and PPP’s Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, Makhdoom Ahmed Mahmood, Rukhsana Bangash and others attended the sitting. A delegation of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Isam Fazl (JUI-F) also joined in.
The leaders from both sides discussed a no-confidence motion and long march, with focus on the method of how they could ensure their no trust motion against the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government, insiders told Minute Mirror.
They added the PML-N leadership presented the proposal of resignation of 10 to 15 disgruntled PTI leaders during the meeting, suggesting that if they tendered their resignation, the ruling government would automatically lose its majority. The PPP, they said, preferred to adopt the option of ‘confidence-vote’ instead ‘no-confidence’.
“The opposition will face embarrassment if the speaker does not accept resignation of the disgruntled PTI leaders,” the sources quoting PPP’s reservation said. The PPP said that this move was the matter of its credibility and they all needed to be very careful about taking any decision, they added.
The sources said that the PPP also gave a proposal to bring no-confidence motion against the speaker, pointing out that bringing no-confidence motion against PM Khan was quite difficult as compared to the speaker. The PPP was also concerned about the role of the speaker if no-confidence motion was brought against the PM.
“First of all, move should be against the speaker,” the PPP was quoted as proposing to the visiting delegation during the meeting.
Insiders said that PML-N assured the PPP to present all the said proposals before PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif.
A declaration issued after the meeting said that the people were fed up of the government due to sky-rocketing inflation and unemployment. The meeting also condemned the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) Amendment Ordinance, terming it a fascist act of the government to curb the freedom of expression in the country. They unanimously decided to get rid of the PTI government.
