LAHORE, May 12: Pakistan Peoples Party leader Malik Ghulam Mustafa Khar has said elections were around the corner due to sharp deline in the acceptability of the government.

Speaking at a condolence reference in memory of Pakistan Railways labour leader Baba Iqbal Zaidi arranged by the Peoples Labour Bureau at the Lahore Press Club here on Friday evening, he said that the rulers had decided to hold the elections because the government had failed to solve the problems of the people and was losing its credibility with every passing day.

He said that he felt that Gen Pervez Musharraf’s time was over and the people were inclined to vote for the PPP.

The party leadership had, however, not been able to create an atmosphere in which Benazir Bhutto could solicit votes in the name of her father.

The government would also resort to rigging to stay in power because it had lost confidence of the people.

He said that Gen Pervez Musharraf wanted to remain in power for another five years but he had lost popularity and his minions would be defeated in the elections.

He was opposed to Mian Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto because he could not face them in the political arena. The present civilian government was serving only a shock absorber of the army which had tarnished its image.

He said that nobody would be able to stop Benazir Bhutto if she decided to return at the right time. The government was, however, trying to weaken the party by patronizing the traitors. He said that the party would have to field new people for winning the general elections. The party could win the elections with the cooperation of the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) but its real test would begin when it would be required to solve the problems of the people after coming to power.

Pakistan Peoples Party Secretary-General Jehangir Badar said in his presidential remarks that the party believed in the commonor’s democracy because it had been formed for the poor.

Dedicated workers were the asset of the party and the have-nots its vanguard. The party would struggle for the abolition of the culture of loot and plunder introduced by the present government.

He advised the party workers to settle their differences within the party instead of bringing a bad name to it by washing their dirty linen in public.

Pakistan Peoples Party, Lahore, Vice-President Chaudhry Ghulam Abbas said that the government had miserably failed to solving the economic problems of the people. Over 40 million people had slid down the poverty line due to increasing gap in the incomes of the rich and the poor.

Lahore PPP secretary and MPA Samiullah Khan said that the government was trying to weaken the political parties. Pakistan Muslim League President Chaudhry Shujaat Husain had been involved in the cooperatives scam in the past and the sugar scandal at present.

Sarfraz Khan and Mian Ibrar Husain said that political parties were silent over the restrictions being imposed on the trade unions.

Habib Bank Union Secretary-General Malik Javed Billu said that the present government was meting out a step-motherly treatment to trade unions.

Punjab Peoples Labour Bureau President Malik Sher Ahmed Awan that people were starving due to exorbitant prices of essential commodities but the assemblies and the senate never bothered to take notice of their hardships.

Peoples Labour Bureau Secretary-General Abdul Qader Shaheen said that the people would not accept the political leaders ignoring the hardships being faced by them due to increase in prices of essential commodities and cost of utility services.

PPP Study Circle Incharge Altaf Ahmed Qureshi said that the policy of remembering the dedicated party workers after their demise required to be reviewed. Workers like Baba Iqbal Zaidi should be honoured during their lifetime instead. He said that the poor had always offered sacrifices for the party and were its asset.

Lahore PPP (Women Wing) President Sajida Mir said that the party should honour the dedicated workers and treat them as its asset.