If Constitution abrogated, country will go to the dogs: Shah

MINGORA: Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah said on Wednesday that if the Constitution was abrogated, the country will be ruined, adding dictators had weakened the state institutions to prolong their rules.
Speaking at a function at the District Bar Association here, he said that dictators had shaken the very foundation of the country and weakened the state institutions. The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) spokesperson and former federal information minister Qamar Zaman Kaira, provincial president Khanzada Khan, district president Shamsher Ali and others were also present on the occasion.
Criticising the former military ruler General Ziaul Haq for imposition of martial law, Khursheed Shah said that the former dictator had sown the seeds of hatred in the society, promoted intolerance and divided the country on ethnic and linguistic grounds. He said that Pakistan was a victim of terrorism, adding that the Jewish lobby was involved in promoting violence to gain its vested interests and defame Muslims. “Some elements are playing in the hands of the enemies to defame Islam,” he added.
He said the previous PPP-led federal government had launched a military operation against the militants in Swat and re-established the state writ. “Had the former chief of army staff General (retd) Ashfaq Parvez Kayani ordered action against the militants during the PPP rule, there would have been no need for the launch of military operation Zarb-e-Azb in North Waziristan,” he said.
He said the PPP had foiled a conspiracy against democracy by supporting the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government during the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) sit-in in Islamabad. Criticising the federal government for the construction of motorways, metro bus and other projects, he said that such projects would not help eradicate poverty.
He said the Kissan Relief Package announced by the federal government was a political gimmick. “The government has instead increased the prices of fertilisers,” he added.Earlier, Khursheed Shah and others visited the office of the deputy commissioner Mehmood Aslam Wazir, who briefed the opposition leader on the damage caused by the October 26 earthquake to property and the following infrastructure and relief and rehabilitation activities in the affected areas.