ISLAMABAD: President of PPP-Parliamentarians Asif Ali Zardari has said that his party will not allow fanatics, any individual or any institution, to usurp power in the name of religion or on any pretext whatsoever.

He said this in a message issued by the party’s media office on Monday on the eve of the 88th birth anniversary of the former prime minister and founder of PPP, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

Mr Zardari said Mr Bhutto had given the country a unanimous constitution, which “envisages that the power to make or amend the Constitution and the laws on behalf of the people rests with the parliament and parliament alone”.

The judiciary, he said, had the powers to review the laws made by the parliament on the touchstone of the Constitution but it could not make laws on its own. “And the executive has to implement those laws without interference,” he added.

Mr Zardari said PPP believed that corruption was a scourge that must be eliminated. However, for far too long only the representatives of the people have been painted black in the name of corruption, he said.

“Selective accountability, sacred cow syndrome, double standards and using corruption for political re-engineering are the worst forms of corruption. It must be resisted. It will be,” he added.

He called for addressing issues in intellectual corruption, saying that those who upheld the constitutional deviations under PCO, validated take-over by dictators and undermined national security through non-state actors must also be held accountable.

On the birth anniversary of Mr Bhutto the party reiterated its pledge to stoutly protect the constitutional scheme of things, Mr Zardari said.

Published in Dawn, January 5th, 2016