PYO, PSF to form parallel organisations

PESHAWAR: People’s Youth Organisation (PYO) and People’s Students Federation (PSF) have decided to announce parallel organisations within a week and initiate province-wide movement to protest against what they termed unilateral decision of naming provincial officer-bearers of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).

“We will hold protest meetings and take out processions in Mardan after Bannu. We will unveil our future line of action at a press conference on Friday,” said Qari Khalid Khan, the former provincial vice-president of PYO. He said they would announce parallel organisations at the district and divisional levels after completing the process. “We will hold a joint press conference in Peshawar before staging a demonstration outside the residence of Zardari in Islamabad,” he added.

Both the PYO and PSF, he said, would also hold their separate functions at the Nishtar Hall in Peshawar to demonstrate their strength and prove that the provincial office-bearers and former ministers had ruined the party and its ideological workers by nominating their handpicked people.

“We have unanimously rejected unilateral nomination of office-bearers and decided to reorganise the party on ideological lines. We appeal to the central leadership to hold intra-party elections. We will approach the NAB to seek investigations against our party’s ministers. We are the heirs of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto and would never allow the corrupt leaders to ruin the party anymore,” he warned.

The PYO and PSO activists reiterated their commitment to bring forward sincere leadership.

They accused the provincial party office-bearers of promoting their personal groups instead of working for the party. “We would continue our campaign till the acceptance of our demands and removal of the inefficient cabinet members. We challenge the provincial cabinet to hold a function anywhere in the province,” said an activist.

The PYO and PSF activists observed that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) was promoting youth, but the PPP provincial leaders create problems for the young people in the party.

According to schedule, the PYO and PSF will organise meetings at Malakand, Charsadda, Lakki Marwat, Dera Ismail Khann, Nowshera, Mansehra, Haripur, Swat, Dir, Swabi and Karak.

Meanwhile, the newly nominated general secretary of People’s Cultural Forum, Syed Tahir Abbas, has also resigned, saying he wasn’t consulted before notifying his name and there was no provision for such an office. He said they had been rendering sacrifices for the party and would do so in future without occupying offices.

A source in the party observed that three party offices including senior vice-president, deputy general secretary and media coordinator were still vacant.

A former member of the People’s Doctors Forum also questioned the nomination of the newly nominated president of the forum. He said the same person had