Nawaz and Zardari to attend today’s APC via video link

ISLAMABAD: Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and former president Asif Ali Zardari will attend the opposition’s All-Parties Conference (APC) via video link today (Sunday), the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) confirmed, amid government warnings of legal action over broadcasting the PML-N supremo’s speech.

In a tweet on Saturday, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said his father, Asif Ali Zardari, will also attend the conference via video link, while Sharif’s virtual attendance was confirmed by Bilawal’s spokesman Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar.

According to Geo News, Khokhar said Sharif had accepted Bilawal’s invitation to attend the conference virtually in a telephone conversation on Friday. The spokesman said the pair had also discussed the country’s political situation and the opposition parties’ future course of action.

Meanwhile, the PML-N on Saturday revealed the names of party members who will form the delegation that will represent it at the APC. Party spokeswoman Marriyum Aurangzeb said she will be joining party president Shahbaz Sharif, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Khawaja Asif, Ahsan Iqbal, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Pervaiz Rashid, Maryam Nawaz, Khawaja Saad Rafique, Rana Sanaullah and Amir Muqam at the conference. Reacting to the developments, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) Shahbaz Gill said Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) and other laws would come into action to prevent Sharif’s address to the APC from being broadcast.

Gill, the Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Political Communication, said it was not acceptable that an “absconding criminal” takes part in political activities and delivers speeches. “The Sharif family can tell nothing but lies. They are such [habitual] liars that they even lied about a disease,” he said.

Later, at a press conference, government spokesman Shibli Faraz and Prime Minister’s aide on accountability, Shahzad Akbar, said the APC is a gathering of “accused” and the opposition should take pause before they “attack” an independent judiciary. Faraz also criticised Nawaz Sharif for being “well enough” to play politics from abroad but not well enough to return to the country to face the law.