PDM meeting decides on future rallies, mass movement tomorrow

ISLAMABAD: A crucial meeting of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) steering committee on Monday would take a decision about further rallies and mass movement to highlight common man’s problems, including price-hike.

PDM President Maulana Fazlur Rehman would chair the meeting. The meeting will review arrangements for demonstration outside the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) headquarters on Tuesday in Islamabad. The committee decisions would be endorsed by the council of the PDM member parties’ heads, subsequently.

PDM Secretary General Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said the Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) leader Maryam Nawaz would make an important announcement on the occasion, who will participate in the demonstration outside the ECP building, and reaching Islamabad tomorrow.

In a brief chat with The News here Saturday, Abbasi said that he had no knowledge about participation of Bilawal Bhutto Zardari in Tuesday’s demonstration, but the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) was wholeheartedly working to make the occasion impressive and successful.

“The government is in a tight corner due to its lies and follies. The ECP has to take decision with regard to the foreign funding of the ruling PTI, that had been thriving on the external illegitimate assistance.

“The foreign funding is not the only issue, the government has dug so many pits where it is bound to fall in,” he said.

The former PM said that the ruling PTI party was living in a fool’s paradise when it talks of division in the PDM ranks, as the alliance is not leading people, but followed by them.

The movement component parties’ survival was linked with unity of the PDM. There is no question about any letup in the movement and the PDM has no option but to live up to the expectations of people, he added.

Shahid Khaqan said people in every part of the country were taking part in the PDM activities. However, Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa were experiencing extreme cold weather and Punjab was in the grip of smog. Despite harshness of the weather, people were actively involved in the PDM rallies. He reminded that all decisions made by the PDM right from the beginning were valid and all components of the movement standby the decisions of the PDM.

Abbasi returned from London last week after visiting his ailing brother-in-law Jehanzaib Abbasi and sister suffering from coronavirus.

He had extensive consultations with PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif in London and made it clear that Nawaz Sharif would not return to Pakistan anytime soon since he had to undergo three major surgeries.

The surgeries were not possible as long as coronavirus was not controlled in the United Kingdom. He said the government would not be able to force Nawaz Sharif to return to Pakistan without his treatment and cancellation of his passport would not cause any problem for him in staying in the UK for treatment.

To another query, Khaqan Abbasi said Broadsheet was engaged in victimising and maligning Nawaz Sharif, but the government had been trapped in the same scam and it was hard for it now to get out of it.

The PML-N leader claimed that the whole party was standing behind Nawaz Sharif’s narrative for the supremacy of the Constitution. The PTI government is by-product of the system that disrespected the will of people, he added.