HARIPUR: Pakistan Peoples Party cast off its lethargy by holding its district convention here at the Benazir Shaheed Hall in the precincts of tehsil municipal administration on Wednesday. A dissident group also staged protest against the sitting district leadership of the party.

PPP provincial general secretary Humayun Khan said that he along with his senior colleagues was on a three-day tour of Hazara division to meet the party office-bearers and workers.

He said that PPP believed in organising masses against the exploitative ruling classes. He said that difference of opinion was the main plank of democratic attitude, but it should be confined to the inner circle of any political organisation.

Referring to his party’s parliamentary practices in the recent past, he said that PPP had been the victim of establishment’s shenanigans since its inception in 1967. He said that the establishment had tried to eliminate PPP from the political firmament, but it had failed to finish it up.

Party convention held in Haripur

Mr Humayun said that after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto the PPP had to join a coalition with its one of political rivals, Awami National Party in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Some of the party people, he said, termed it a kind of opportunism, but there was no way with the party to foil the ugly designs of hidden forces against the democratic process. He said that party chairman Bilwal Bhutto had advised all political office-holders to organise the party at ward level.

Rahimdad Khan, a former PPP provincial president and member of central executive committee of the party, lashed out at the provincial government, which according to him was opposed to the enforcement of essential services law in PIA and in favour of its enactment in KP hospitals.

He said that Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf had deprived the councillors of their lawful rights by bringing wholesale amendments into the relevant local bodies law. He said that PPP would emerge as the strongest political force of the country in near future.

Nighat Orakzai, provincial president of PPP women wing, said that her party had to contest 2013 elections in the worst conditions. She said it was not a level playing field for them because terrorist groups were against the party candidates across the province. She claimed that terrorist outfits had actually allowed the PML-N and the religious-cum-political parties to contest the elections.

Hasrat Khan, district president of People’s Youth Organisation, criticised the party high-ups for ignoring district level organisations. He lashed out at the district office-bearers and accused them of division in the party ranks. He claimed that the local leadership had allied with PTI in the local bodies elections.

Speaking on the occasion, PPP district president Zulfiqar Ahmad Qureshi claimed that now masses were once again looking towards the PPP, which in its tenure had launched many welfare projects for the poor.

District president of Peoples Lawyers Forum, Khursheed Azhar, said that the present regime had deprived the working class of its basic rights.

Gul Naz Rasheed advocate, president of PPP Women Wing Hazara division, Aslam Adil, provincial general secretary of Peoples Labour Bureau, district general secretary Raja Javed and others also spoke on the occasion.

A sizable group of disgruntled workers, led by former MPA Dr Faeza Rasheed, displayed placards inscribed with slogans against some women leaders of PPP. A lady protester also hit the vehicle of Nighat Orakzai with a wooden stick and threw eggs on it. Later, Nighat Orakzai advised a local PPP leader to lodge an FIR on her behalf against Dr Faeza Rasheed.

Published in Dawn, February 11th, 2016