Distrust between PM Imran, Chaudhrys exists amid progress on accord implementation

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan’s decision not to meet the Chaudhrys of Gujrat during his Sunday visit to Lahore despite their publicly voiced reservations about the approach of the senior coalition partner has not gone well with them.

“Courtesy demanded that the prime minister should have met the top leadership of his ally, the Pakistan Muslim League-Q (PML-Q), when it had openly articulated its grievances and complaints,” PML-Q insiders told The News. However, when contacted, prominent PML-Q leader Chaudhry Moonis Elahi said that the federal team comprising Defence Minister Pervez Khattak and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) stalwart Jehangir Tareen was working his party to implement the agreement signed with it at the time of forging the coalition following the 2018 general elections.

To a question, the insiders said when Imran Khan stated in Lahore that he knows who is hatching the conspiracy in Punjab, he did not allude to the Chaudhrys and in fact addressed some others. “It is an open secret that the PML-Q has not plotted to destabilise the Usman Buzdar government and has no plan to dislocate it.”

The insiders said the prime minister’s declaration that he was not bothered about any party’s support and would not be blackmailed by anyone was not new because he has been making it from day one. Its repetition in Lahore needs to be read in that context, they said.

They said that the execution of the accord has already begun but cautioned that the next two weeks were very important, and if the written promises and commitments were not fulfilled within this timeframe and the PML-Q did not become fully satisfied, there would be a lot of trouble and disturbance.

The insiders said that it would be clear within this timeline whether the ongoing realisation of the understating was real or “topi drama” (fake). “In case, the exercise proves to be a lip service, Tareen and Khattak would become irrelevant as the game would slip out of their hands.”

Top PML-Q leader and Punjab Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Pervez Elahi has earlier stated that the prime minister should not view the allies with suspicions and if there is anything (controversial) comes to his notice, he should get it confirmed before believing it.

The speaker said they got Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s sit-in wrapped up peacefully through negotiations, but instead of receiving encouragement for that, their role was doubted.

Pervez Elahi lamented that when PML-Q President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain came back from Germany after his treatment, Imran Khan did not care to inquire about his health. Even during his Lahore visit, he persisted with his old approach.

He said that if the overall government team was not good, it was a point to do a deep thinking by the premier. “We had told Usman Buzdar that he would consult with the PML-Q in making administration appointments in just four out of 36 districts of Punjab where its candidates had won.”

The speaker said it had been agreed that the PML-Q nominees would be taken as ministers each in Punjab and at the federal level, but the party has been given only one federal portfolio. He said that the PML-Q leaders also objected that they have been given only one ministry in Punjab. “Some people have attempted to create rift in the Chaudhrys’ family on the pretext of inducting Moonis Elahi in the federal cabinet. We pointed out that this policy is not correct.”

About the flour shortage crisis, Pervez Elahi said they had advised that wheat from Sindh should be allowed to come in Punjab, which had been stopped. “The Punjab government doesn’t have control at the lower levels. Problems exist and Buzdar is responsible to some extent.” A federal government source told The News that the prime minister’s meeting with the Chaudhrys of Gujrat during his Lahore trip was not included in his busy schedule.