LAHORE: The Pakistan People’s Party observed the seventh death anniversary of Benazir Bhutto by holding a vigil and seminars, donating blood and offering Quran Khwani in Punjab on Thursday.

In Lahore, the PPP held two functions. The PPP leadership had asked the workers in Punjab to observe the anniversary at the district level. Earlier, special trains and buses would take the workers from Punjab to Garhi Khuda Bakhsh to take part in the anniversary.

Speaking at a function at the PPP Secretariat in Model Town, party’s Punjab chapter president Manzoor Wattoo said extremism and terrorism had to be defeated because other options would prove an exercise in futility.

He said the nation was united to eliminate terrorists from its soil as the extremists could not be allowed to impose “toxic ideology” at gunpoint.

“The present rulers had good contacts with extremists and their patrons and won the elections with their support,” Wattoo said.

He said the Peshawar tragedy was the most heinous crime of the same mindset that assassinated Benazir Bhutto. He said some leaders had been doing politics while sitting in foreign countries but BB did the politics for the poor.

He recalled that Zulfikar Ali Bhutto gave the Constitution that empowered the people with the right to vote. The PPP government had restored the 1973 Constitution through the 18th Amendment, which was mutilated by the successive dictators just to perpetuate their rule.

PPP Secretary-General Latif Khosa said the PPP was the victim of “delayed law” because the presidential reference of ZA Bhutto and the case of Benazir had not been taken up by courts despite a lapse of many years.

Azizur Rehman Chan said the assassination of Benazir and the Peshawar tragedy were the crimes committed by the same mindset.

The PPP leaders and workers also held a candlelit vigil as an expression of respect for Benazir and the victims of Peshawar tragedy. They also held Quran Khwani for the departed souls.

At another function at Aiwan-i-Iqbal, Senator Aitzaz Ahsan said the PPP was the worst victim of terrorism. He said there had been no parallel of the sacrifices made by ZAB and Benazir.

Dr Khalid Jan presented his poem ‘Main Baghi Haun’. PPP Lahore President Samina Ghurki also paid a tribute to Benazir.

Published in Dawn, December 28th, 2014