ISLAMABAD: Instead of targeting the government, the country’s three major opposition parties on Thursday held each other responsible for the disintegration of their Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) alliance, damaging the opposition’s cause and providing clandestine support to the government.

It all started when Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari in his speech at a workers’ convention at Rahim Yar Khan lashed out at the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) for not supporting his proposal of moving a no-confidence motion against Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar and accused it of doing politics of “hypocrisy”.

In an apparent reference to PML-N, the PPP chief said that the parties that raised the slogan vote ko izzat do (respect the vote) should use their votes to dislodge Mr Buzdar from the office of chief minister.

Mr Bhutto-Zardari said if the opposition parties did nothing against the Buzdar government, it would prove that “their politics is neither of resistance nor of reconciliation but of hypocrisy”.

The PPP chairman, who is on a week-long visit to south Punjab, said that people of the province would reject the “politics of hypocrisy”.

“Dual politics does not stand a chance. Either you have to challenge the incapable, failed and illegitimate government or have to accept that you are the facilitator of this selected government,” he maintained. “You have to send (the) Buzdar government packing and then the selected prime minister will flee automatically.”

“On one hand you talk about respecting vote, on the other you do not want to use your votes. If you do not do so then the people of Punjab will not forgive you. Then the people will themselves hold accountable the puppet who had stolen their votes,” he said.

Instead of PML-N, PDM president Maulana Fazlur Rehman came forward to respond to Mr Bhutto-Zardari’s remarks. Addressing a Tahaffuz-i- Namoos-i-Risalat Conference at Abbottabad, an angry Maulana Fazl claimed that it was in fact the PPP that had caused “irreparable damage” to the opposition’s anti-government movement by quitting the PDM at a crucial time.

The Maulana, who is also the head of Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI-F), also rebutted the repeated claim of Mr Bhutto-Zardari that PPP was the founder of the PDM, stating that the alliance had been formed by all the opposition parties.

Addressing a news conference after presiding over a meeting of the PDM heads in Karachi on Aug 28, Maulana Fazl had assailed the PPP for attempting to “stab the opposition movement in its back” and gave a strong indication that the alliance had moved on from seeking any future reunion with the party.

Hours after the media reported Maulana Fazl’s remarks, PPP’s information secretary and former deputy speaker of the National Assembly Faisal Karim Kundi issued a statement, alleging that the JUI-F chief had damaged the PDM only to save himself from the clutches of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).

“Maulana Fazlur Rehman has played a fundamental role in the breaking up of the PDM. But it is a matter of pleasure that after breaking up the PDM, he has got rid of NAB,” said Mr Kundi, who is an arch rival of the Maulana in their Dera Ismail Khan hometown.

Mr Kundi further alleged that through en masse resignations from the assemblies, the Maulana wanted to strengthen the hands of the “puppet prime minister” to provide him an opportunity to roll back the 18th Constitution Amendment. He recalled that in 2002, the Maulana had become the opposition leader after “striking a deal with the establishment”.

The PPP leader asked the JUI-F chief to tell the nation as to what was the offer he had received after which he had announced ending his party’s sit-in in Islamabad in 2019.

When contacted, PML-N vice president and former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi downplayed Mr Bhutto-Zardari’s remarks, saying his statement did not deserve a comment. He said the PPP chairman had issued the statement only to target the PML-N as he was on a visit to Punjab for which his party (PPP) had done nothing.

Mr Abbasi said by quitting the opposition’s alliance, PPP had lost the trust of the opposition parties. He said they were not interested in bringing the PPP back into the PDM’s fold.

The statements from the leaders of the three major opposition parties came a day before the meeting of the executive committee of the PDM in Islamabad.

According to a PDM office-bearer, the meeting has been convened to finalise the schedule of the anti-government public meetings and to discuss the draft of the proposed “Charter of Pakistan”.

The PDM had resurrected the idea of preparing “Charter of Pakistan” containing its proposals to resolve problems being faced by the nation and aimed at establishing a true constitutional and democratic system in the country in a meeting held last month.

The PPP and the Awami National Party were also part of the PDM which had been formed during a PPP-hosted multi-party conference in Islamabad in September 2019, but the two parties quit the alliance earlier this year over differences on the issue of en masse resignations from parliament.

Irfanul Haq in Rahim Yar Khan also contributed to the report

Published in Dawn, September 10th, 2021