LAHORE: After spending a busy week in Lahore in connection with PPP’s foundation day, former president Asif Ali Zardari left for Karachi on Saturday.

The PPP co-chairman told the partymen he would reach out to every worker through video conferencing.

“Through the use of technology while sitting anywhere in Pakistan I will get in touch with the party workers and office-bearers of the remotest part of the country,” he said.

Mr Zardari said the PPP could not afford to weaken the political system as it was tantamount to weakening the people and the PPP. He said he had been striving hard for the evolution of the political system because developed system could ensure desirable political stability, economic prosperity and integrity of the federation where people would enjoy equal rights.

“Had the people of East Pakistan given the rights the creation of Bangladesh would have been a distant reality for all times to come,” he said.

The co-chairman said the electoral setbacks were normal in a democratic dispensation. “The PPP will regain its popularity through electoral process as it did in the past.”

He said the Supreme Court’s judgment in the Asghar Khan case proved the assertion of Benazir Bhutto that PPP’s mandate had been stolen. “Similarly, ROs (returning officers) elections will be judged by the history and it is only a matter of time,” he said.

Mr Zardari said the party workers were an invaluable asset. The elevation of Raja Pervez Ashraf to the position of prime minister, Nayyar Hussain Bokhari to Senate chairman and Syed Mehdi Shah to chief minister of Gilgit-Baltistan was the physical manifestations of the high esteem the party leadership held them, he said.

Published in Dawn, December 7th, 2014