Spat erupts between Salman Akram, Marwat

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Secretary General Salman Akram Raja (SAR) Thursday questioned senior party leader Sher Afzal Marwat’s ‘competence’ to talk on party matters, as the later raised a query over his status as the party’s office-holder.

Both expressed views about each other in two different talk shows but from the same private television channel, indicating all is not well at all within the party.

It all started, when a clip of Salman Akram’s remarks against Marwat were shown to him (Marwat) during which the former questions his understanding of the party’s policy matters and says only two or four party people are deemed capable of having the right to talk about the party.

“He (Marwat) is invited by different TV channels and daily he issues a statement, which has nothing to do with the party’s narrative or thinking. He does not comprehend the matters and everyday says something,” Salman Akram said about Marwat.

When asked about Marwat’s statement after meeting with the PTI supremo Imran Khan that the party founder chairman said that if the committee meeting was not facilitated with him, even then there was no issue, there should be three-four sessions of the committees’ meetings, Salman Akram Raja played it down and said he did not consider his talk, as that of the party.

“PTI is a very big party and don’t consider his statement as the policy of the party of that of Imran Khan, Salman Akram had said earlier in a talk show.

On having seen the clip, Marwat straightly asked the anchor what the relationship of Salman Akram with PTI was, and when told that he was appointed by ‘Khan Sahab’, he retorted, “Have you seen any notification, for as per the party constitution, only an individual, who has contested the intra-party polls can be its secretary general”.

He continued, “If we will flout our own party’s constitution, then how we can talk about the constitution of Pakistan. He (SAR) can’t be made secretary general this way, who is talking about my understanding of the party matters. I tried to remain silent, but he crossed the red line, then how I can be silent”.

Marwat advised Salman Akram to mind his own business and if he would speak more about him, then he would also get response. He insisted that after Omar Ayub resigned as secretary general, now officially, deputy secretary general, Shamim Naqvi was the secretary general. Then he asked the anchor if he had seen any notification, bearing signatures of Salman Akram. He wondered what kind of understanding he was talking about, who (SAR) stays in Lahore for 15 days and then comes to Islamabad for a day.

He regretted that Salman Akram talked personal things and asked how could be talk this way on the national media about him. “How can he taunt me, who has been Nawaz Sharif’s lawyer in Panama case and of Khawaja Asif, and who was PMLN’s Nausheen Iftikhar’s lawyer against PTI’s candidate Asjad Malhi.

“He talks against me, whereas his job is to talk on policies of the PMLN government and Nawaz Sharif or the establishment.

Earlier, during the TV talk show, Salman Akram said that they have informed the government that ‘we are ready for the next session of talks. There has been no response from the government regarding the next session of talks’.

“We gave names to the jail authorities for the regular meeting (with Imran Khan), but there was no response. We also said that the meeting should be held in the same room where the regular meeting is held. It is an experience of two and a half years that the government makes childish decisions in anger,” SAR said.

He continued whatever decision the government takes regarding the talks will come out soon. “We are completely satisfied with the talks and are waiting for the government’s decision. He also clarified that it is not that the process of talks was stopped because of the founder’s tweet, it was already stopped.